The Greatest Show on Earth

Entering its 55th year, the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show (FLIBS), the largest in-water boat show in the world, is set to take place from October 30 to November 3 attracting an international audience of thousands of marine enthusiasts to the 'Yachting Capital of the World.' Show-goers come from all corners of the globe to experience the biggest and best array of marine products and accessories in the one locale.

From amazing superyachts to fishing boats, runabouts and boats for every budget, the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show delivers the excitement of boating, for any lifestyle. Each year show organisers strive to deliver new, exciting features to enrich the overall show experience and engage audiences.

Featuring nearly $4 billion worth of boats and marine products across more than 280,000 square metres of exhibitor space, the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show is known for its astounding number of luxury boats which attract enthusiasts from around the world.

The boat show is said to bring around half a billion dollars into the city – more than the Super Bowl.

The logistics for setup are staggering: more than ten kilometres of floating docks; six huge show tents, and at least 10 trucks full of carpeting.

Just getting hundreds of boats into their designated berths at the six different marinas takes five days. And that's using a tight schedule of planned entry times, so that all the boats fit in properly.

Building the pavilions and other facilities for 100,000-plus attendees takes nearly two weeks.

Exhibitors marvel at how well the plans work, even as the event gets bigger and more complicated.

Show Management produces the annual extravaganza and works year-round to get it right. "We have 20,000 exhibitors and crew credentialed people  building in the days before the show," said Drew Graziano, chief operating officer of the Fort Lauderdale-based company. "That's a small city."

"And it's all orchestrated," he said. At Show Management offices, the walls of the conference room display giant maps of the marinas and berths. Each has papers cut to size for each boat and mounted on magnets. The team moves the papers around to decide placement and schedules and transfers all of that to computers and mobile apps.

"It's a real invasion of Normandy kind of thing," said Efrem "Skip" Zimbalist III, owner of Show Management.

For show-goers, the team works months in advance with Florida Department of Transportation and municipal officials to try to avoid road closures around event time. Plus, it coordinates 25 buses, 14 water taxis and three river buses that handle attendees during the show, Graziano said.

"When you are running all that transportation, you have to make sure you have proper personnel to handle anything that can come up," such as traffic accidents or ill-timed traffic lights, he said.

What's harder to plan, of course, is the weather for a show that's held in the waning weeks of hurricane season.

Superstorm Sandy dumped hefty rain on the event, owned by the Marine Industries Association of South Florida, in 2012. Yet Show Management is working to reduce that risk, too.

"We're planning to move the show one week later next year because of the weather," Zimbalist said. It will start on the first Thursday of November, not the last Thursday of October.

For more information go to: http://www.showmanagement.com/fort-lauderdale-international-boat-show-2014/event/