The North American Honey Bee Expo Blog

In August 2023, I received an email from Kamon Reynolds (Tennessee’s Bees) inviting me to attend the inaugural North American Honey Bee Expo in Louisville, Kentucky. Needless to say, I didn’t think twice before accepting the incredibly generous invitation!

I started my journey to Louisville on the 3rd January 2023, not really knowing what to expect. I have been to a few shows in the UK, with my most recent experience at The Beekeeping Show in Telford in February ’23, so I suppose that’s what I was building my expectations around.

After a 23-hour door-to-door journey, I arrived at the hotel in the middle of a mass evacuation of the Crowne Plaza. Apparently, someone had been testing their bee smoker in their room, prompting a full hotel evacuation (turned out it was actually just a regular smoker not following the rules).

After a short nap, it was straight into Day 1 of the Expo, which was only a 5-minute walk away from the hotel. From the first sight of the Expo centre, I was in total awe of the size of the facility. I know the USA doesn’t tend to do things by halves, but this was on an entirely different level. It didn’t look like an exhibition centre: it looked like an airport! Even the trucks that everyone arrived in were supersized. Richard Noel and I agreed, the jeep was the pick of the bunch.

As I arrived into the building, I was greeted by a friendly team who gave me my name tag for the event. This was such a good idea and something I think the UK shows could adopt. It made you feel a bit special but it also made communicating with people so much easier as you could see their name and where they were from and everyone also got a nice memento to take home with them.

As I walked around the lobby and began to take things in, I still couldn’t quite get over the scale of the event that was about to take place. Everything about the centre was at least 10 times bigger than anything I had ever experienced before. I made my way over to the vendor hall to see how everything was coming together; it was still around two hours before the doors would be opening, yet 3000 beekeepers were already patiently waiting outside in a very orderly queue.

As I walked through the doors into the vendor hall, the sheer size and scale of the event truly hit me. The room was already buzzing with hundreds of staff, vendors and volunteers, all putting together the final touches to their stalls.

Now you can take the boy out of England, but you can’t take England out of the boy, so the next stop had to be a nice cup of tea; I was therefore more than delighted to discover yet another surprise: tea, coffee, biscuits, cakes, muffins – all were free, all day for the full three-day event. It was really nice tea and coffee as well, sponsored very kindly by Rossman’s Apiaries which was just next door to the drinks facility. This was a theme that continued all the way throughout the conference. The Americans never ever miss an opportunity for marketing.

Take Cowen Manufacturing as the next example. As I was wandering around the relatively empty trade show, I was immediately drawn to the droves of heavy-duty extraction equipment: not just a couple of extractors and a token cappings spinner, but literally every conceivable piece of commercial grade extraction equipment you could possibly imagine. It was very impressive but, in my mind, what followed next was even more impressive.

Next to the extraction machinery was a table set up with hoodies, t-shirts, caps etc which I was drawn to as they looked so colourful and appealing. The lady asked, would I like one, and as a typical Brit abroad, I replied: ‘It’s ok, I am only browsing’ to which she replied: ‘Really? They’re all FREE!’ They had brought to the show an unbelievable number of freebies.

Obviously, I promptly changed from browsing to hoarding and politely accepted a cap and a t-shirt. The lady then insisted that I took some more and couldn’t possibly just leave with only two items. So, I left the stall with the following branded freebies: t-shirt, hoodie, hive tool, cap, frisbee, yoyo, planner, pencils, pens, spinners, stickers, badges. It was quite the experience and, in my mind, incredibly effective marketing. We need to bring this to the UK: free stuff for everyone! Being given useful products makes you feel warmly towards the business and that has to be worth a great deal.

This continued throughout the whole conference, every single day. It wasn’t just a first hour smash and grab: all the vendors brought enough freebies for everyone. My pick of the week was some moulded, pink, plastic frames from Acorn Beekeeping in recognition of Breast Cancer Awareness. I managed to get 6 frames which I plan to raise a nucleus on and then auction for the charity later this year. Watch this space.

You probably didn’t start reading this article to hear about my free badges and choice of hot drinks, so let’s get on with the good stuff. In addition to the free merchandise, drinks and snacks, the extraordinary effort made by the vendors to showcase their full range of products made the event really informative, educational and stimulating. The vendor hall was very similar to what you would find the in the UK but it was bigger and better in terms of scale and range of equipment. All the vendors seemed to have brought in as much equipment as they possibly could. For example, HillCo LLC (my sponsor for the event) brought 7 x Semis (Arctic wagons) FULL of equipment. I think they shifted most of it as well.

What was also really great is that every single mainstream vendor who operates in the US was there in attendance. People and companies had travelled from all over the US to attend. It was Kamon’s first honey bee expo under the new branding after all, and no one wanted to miss out.

As people streamed into the event, the vendor hall started to fill up very quickly and while visitors collected their freebies and pre-orders, I took the opportunity to have a look around the other facilities on offer at the event.

First stop was the auditorium where many guests were scheduled to speak over the next three days. Again, the size of the room was ginormous, seating around 1000 people! I didn’t actually get to attend any talks whilst I was at the expo as I was too busy chatting with people in the trade hall (and drinking tea and pilfering freebies), but I wasn’t worried as all the talks were recorded, whereas such a rich opportunity for networking just couldn’t be missed. I was impressed that all the visitors would be sent links to the live events, allowing you to watch later at your leisure and continue engaging with the expo after the four days - a really nice and very smart touch.

The next room along from the auditorium was the honey show, which had already been filled with numerous entries, ranging from honey to mead to cake to art - you name it, there was a category for it. People were in really good spirits, placing their entries down with the hope of snagging a coveted blue ribbon. At that point, I was very politely asked to leave and not film. Whoops!

By this time, I was hungry from all that walking around, drinking tea and eating muffins, so decided to go and see what the food options were. There were six vendors and at least 500 seats with comfortable tables for people to settle round while eating their food and chatting about their bees. Over the three days, I enjoyed pizza, southern fried chicken, pulled pork and empanadas and it was all really nice. My new year diet starts in February this year! It was all really tasty but I loved the table layout the most as it offered so much space to relax and eat in comfort.

By this point, I finally felt ready to track down some of the YouTube stars I have been following for years and embarrass myself in front of them. The real plan was actually just to interview them but after numerous camera malfunctions, I think I succeeded in both!

Before I did that, I gave Kamon Reynolds a Bee Expo branded BBWear Ultra suit, that was kindly gifted by James from BBWear. Many people commented on the quality of the suit and Kamon was very happy with his gift. A massive thanks to James for supplying Kamon with the suit, free of charge.

Bob Binnie, Frederick Dunne, Paul Kelly, Kamon Reynolds, Jeff Horchoff, Randy McAffrey, Jose Uribe, Richard Noel were all in attendance and I eventually managed to interview pretty much every single one of them. The video is now live on my YouTube channel if you fancy watching me embarrassing myself in front of my YouTube idols! For me, this was the absolute highlight of the show. Being able to meet and talk to my favourite YouTube stars was not only very surreal, but also incredibly useful. I got some brilliant tips on how to set up my cameras and film videos for my YouTube channel from the very best in the business.

What was also incredibly humbling was the number of people who stopped by to say hello and talk about bees. I knew a few people from the US watched my videos, but I genuinely wasn’t anticipating quite how many people would be up for a chat or picture - nothing though in comparison to Richard Noel, who is a superstar over here!

Over the next two days, I continued to visit pretty much every single stall, many more than once, to talk with the vendors and test out their products. What was really nice was the range of products that were on offer: everything from industrial scale honey extraction lines to simple homemade solutions to problems encountered by individual vendors.

For example, one vendor has developed a plastic moulded unit to hold a used honeycomb that could then be attached to a 5m long pole, the idea being you try to catch the queen from a swarm in awkward locations where a ladder is unsuitable. Nice idea!

One thing I was looking out for from the very beginning was a product from a company called Apis Engineering. They developed a really simple aircraft grade aluminium rest that attaches to the steering wheel of a truck, allowing for a frame to be rested upon it to facilitate grafting in a vehicle. I was just getting my wallet out to pay for it and the owner said I could have it for free if I showcased it in a video - an amazingly generous gesture so … watch this space. Video to follow on my YouTube channel.

Another nice idea was from a company called CreamPAL. Their invention was a pressurised auger style creaming machine, yours for a mere $33000 - but the resulting product was as smooth as yoghurt and definitely worth it for the right operation. Apparently, they are designing a mini version for the European market to retail at around $8000. If they do, I will be buying one without a doubt.

There was a hive called the Propola hive where the inside surfaces had been etched with grooves to increase the surface area, to be primed with propolis. The idea was to make it much more similar to the inside of a tree with a propolis envelope. It would make scraping impossible but, again, a really cool idea.

I really enjoyed watching everyone bring a selection of their own honey in small jars to be traded with other attendees via a very well co-ordinated honey swap. It was a really nice touch and what a brilliant way to leave the show, with a lovely assortment of different honeys from all over the country.

Inspired by such a wonderful celebration of beekeeping lore, I couldn’t resist dressing up the statue outside the venue in a beekeeping suit. Indeed, I felt it would have been rude not to although I did some very funny looks from some people.

Similar looks were achieved when I asked someone to push me around the vendor show on a trolley to film for YouTube. (This is probably why I don’t get asked to attend too many events!) I did have fun trying to shoot the varroa off a wooden bee’s back though. We definitely need to bring this to the UK. It was really good fun!

Over the course of the 4 days that I was in Louisville, I was made to feel wonderfully welcome for my first ever visit to the USA. I met some brilliant beekeepers and was able to chat to some of my beekeeping idols. I even got a lift home to the hotel one evening from Bob Binnie!

I am now looking ahead to The Beekeeping Show in Telford and I want to try and bring some of what I have learnt to the UK, to turbocharge what was already an excellent show. I will have to work on some ideas for Black Mountain Honey freebies to distribute at the show and see if we can persuade someone to sponsor a tea booth to keep everyone refreshed throughout the event!