Each morning in the Retail Resource Center at the Las Vegas Market the team at the North American Home Furnishings Association serves breakfast. This includes freshly squeezed orange juice from the juiciest oranges you've seen in your life. The juice is actually squeezed while you wait!

They also serve coffee, tea and breakfast burritos, but the true stars of first meal in the RRC are the Belgian Waffles. They are made to order with your choice of applewood bacon bits, fresh strawberries, pecans or any combination of all three. Everyone comes for the waffles! My personal favorite is the bacon and pecan waffle. Nom Nom!!

So where am I going with this? NAHFA staff begin serving breakfast at 7:30 each morning. This is universally known to all retailers; both members and non-members and foot traffic in the RRC is typically very heavy around this time. This is a very valuable time for vendors as we are afforded a golden opportunity to meet with, interact with and educate retailers nationwide about the services we provide. To put the amount of traffic we've seen over the past three days in perspective, the team served so many waffles that they broke both waffle makers. Fortunately they were prepared with two additional back up waffle makers so no one went hungry.

As a Preferred Partner of the NAHFA, any face-to-face interaction we have with a potential client is invaluable. If it takes a delicious waffle to facilitate that interaction then so be it.

So what is the true value of a Belgian Waffle? Get back to me in about 30 days and I will have an answer for you. In the meantime, swing by the RRC tomorrow morning and have a waffle with Jason and me. Just be sure to save me some bacon and pecans.

Charles Dortch, III
Vice President of Sales