America’s only professional costumers’ organisation The National Costumers Association (NCA) has reported back on its annual board meeting and other business which took place during the Halloween and Party Expo earlier this year.
Costumers from all over America came together for the H&P Expo 2020, which took place from 17 – 19 January at New Orleans’ Convention Center. The NCA hosted a booth at the show as well as holding both its 2020 business meeting and winter board meeting during the period.
The NCA booth acted as a key meeting place for NCA members and show attendees alike, with a silent auction also raising $250 for the NCA Scholarship Fund. The show also allowed new NCA managers Ed Avis and Kathleen Furore to meet members and learn more about the costuming industry.
“It was great to meet so many NCA members at the show,” said Kathleen. “We got a lot of great new story ideas that we’ll be able to incorporate in coming issues of The Costumer magazine and on the website.”
The NCA’s official annual business meeting took place in the evening on Saturday 18 January. NCA president Marion Bradley opened the meeting, thanking Gold and Platinum Vendor Members for their support – including West Bay, Halco and Sunnywood and Rubie’s, Forum and Smiffy’s.
Ed Avis went on to outline the communications plan, which includes making the NCA website more news-oriented tohelp raise the organisation’s profile, attract more traffic to the website and drive business for advertisers. “Increasing the quality of the information coming from the NCA will help the organisation attract members and help the industry as a whole,” he said.
As part of this, the NCA is also launching a series of webinars and virtual roundtables. “The roundtables are online forums in which members can meet other members and discuss whatever issues they want,” Ed explained.
The official NCA board meeting took place on the Monday following the Expo. Issues discussed included the mission of the association, which will now focus on building vendor/buyer relations and emphasising the social and networking benefits of membership.
