Page 14 - The Decorative Painter Summer 2017

Business Corner
Email: katie@bearwithusinc.com Website: www.bearwithus.com 1331 Green Forest Ct. #16 Winter Garden, FL 34787
T: (407) 347-5939 F: (407) 369-8353
The Bear With Us warehouse is open to the public when they aren’t on a trade floor some- where. The booth comes back to the warehouse after each show and is set up until the next trip. If you are in the Winter Garden neighborhood, be sure to stop in. Call to make sure they are home – (407) 347-5939.
day on the trade floor. As the line lengthens and doors open to allow vendors into their booths, we peer in, hoping for a sneak peek of new products and locations of our favorite booths. The anticipa- tion is unbearable! When the clock strikes the hour, we surge through, going left or right, taking in all of our favorite exhibitors.
This article is about what it’s like to have a booth space in the SDP Conference Expo. In describing life on the trade floor and what it takes to get there, I’m featuring one of everyone’s favorite long-time SDP businesses, Bear With Us, Inc., owned by Katie and Bob Van Horn.
Bear With Us’ home base is in Winter Garden, Florida. Bob Van Horn works to provide unfinished wood turnings, wood cutouts and ornaments either by scroll saw, laser cutting, or importing. They
have plates, candlesticks, brass charms, and pattern packets from some of your favorite SDP teachers and artists, just to name a few of the irresistible items in their inventory. Every visitor to the trade floor winds up in the Bear With Us booth at some point. No one can resist!
Bear With Us, Inc. began in 1983 in Missouri by Bob and his dad. Their first SDP Conference was in Dallas in 1988 with three cutouts: a bear, a
Life on the SDP Exhibit Hall
gingerbread man, and a goose. Since then, they are a familiar sight each year, usually located at the side or end of the trade floor where their four to five booth spaces can be accommodated in a neat, long row. Bob and Katie estimate they have produced and sold over 35 million cutouts in their years of business at conventions.
Bob drives his vast inventory in a large box truck, putting about 25,000 miles on it each year. Katie goes with him when possible, but for the longer treks she stays home to operate the busi- ness and then flies to catch up. They hire four to six people who join them at shows, taking two full days to set up, and after the show opens, at least three people oversee customer check out while Bob handles inventory and questions. At day’s end, it’s dinner and bed, although a couple of evenings are always reserved for a pizza party or ice cream social with other SDP exhibitors, who have become close family over the years.
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nyone who has been at an SDP Conference
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knows the anticipation and thrill of opening
Support your SDP Business members!
12 The Decorative Painter • SUMMER 2017 DECORATIVEPAINTERS.ORG