WHO WE ARE
Masters in international stand building
People are online 24/7. As a result, time never really stands still anymore and people are processing information at an unimaginable speed. However, on-screen attention span is limited. For brands, this means standing out from the pack and grabbing full attention of an audience has become increasingly difficult.
That’s where stand building comes in. A trade show gives brands around the world the possibility to engage with an audience at an offline venue where the attention span is bigger. Stand builders, like STND, are therefore a partner for brands in ensuring the brand can be fully experienced by its audience in a face-2-face encounter.
HOW IT STARTED
Capturing the essence of a brand
The event industry. That’s where our founder and current CEO grew up in. From trade shows to summer music festivals and additionally pop up stores, sampling units and POS displays. However, the concept of stand building drew Tom’s attention most.
He gained in-depth knowledge of capturing the essence of a brand and translating it into a temporary, yet high quality platform. Influenced by the enchanting atmosphere of music festivals, Tom went on to create a signature stand identity. He thereby always emphasizes the importance of making visitors experience a brand rather than just looking at it.
And here we are, +30 years later, building stands for brands that travel the world.
FOUNDER
We’re like bacon and eggs.
Hi there, I’m Tom and stand building is what I do best.
You might as well just call me addicted to offering brands a high quality platform that make visitors experience it to the fullest. As an exhibition stand to start off with, perhaps translating that same stand into pop up stores, corporate interiors or product displays in a next stage.
Long story short: brands and me, we’re like bacon and eggs. We just make each other better. Let’s connect on LinkedIn and follow me around.
Our story
Underdog
Tom started his own stand building company in 2000. As a well-known entrepreneur located in Antwerp, he and his team quickly became an allround event partner for popular brands in the area.
Financial crisis
The financial crisis of 2012 challenged a highly competitive event industry and made Tom reflect about the company’s services, resulting in a signature stand identity that differentiated the company from the pack.
Premium partner
Due to creative and performing stand designs, Tom and his team became premium stand builders for Belgian brands in areas such as logistics, food & beverage, cosmetics, furniture, IT services, …
Business growth
The company started to grow significantly. Not only in terms of customer brands, but also in terms of employees to a team of +80 designers, project managers, wood workers, carpenters, painters etc.
Partnership
Business growth drew the attention of the world’s most famous music festival, Tomorrowland, resulting in a partnership to build all of the event’s hospitality platforms in Belgium and France.
Global scope
The stand building activities started to become increasingly international. A change of events that made it necessary to re-evaluate the way in which the stand building activities were set up.
Belgium’s finest
Tom decided to change course and offer his stand building services specifically to brands that travel the world. He therefore founded STND and gathered the best men he worked with in the past 20 years.
HOW IT’S GOING
For brands that travel the world.
In 2020 STND was established with a clear focus on a very specific niche market: brands that travel the world.
These include Belgian brands that exhibit both domestically and abroad as well as foreign brands that want to set foot on European soil.
OUR VALUES
What we stand for.
From the quality of a stand to the way in which we organise our teams: brands that travel the world benefit from these six company values that we find crucial in our daily work.
Client centricity
We put the business objectives of our customer’s trade show presence at the heart of our stand design. Hence, we design our stands to fully support your objectives.
Dedication
We use a single unit approach, which means there is only one fully dedicated team that designs, transports and builds a stand so that no informations gets lost along the way.
Professionalism
As we always choose quality over quantity, our work flow is highly organised. All projects are therefore professionally executed and finished off to perfection.
Bespoke design
We believe stand constructions and furnishing can only reflect corporate identity when it’s made to fully match it. We therefore only build custom or bespoke exhibition stands.
Brand focused
We made name for ourselves by making a difference in brand experience, which is no surprise as we believe brand experiences are equally important as the company’s product or service itself.
Creativity
We are always looking for designs that spark an interested for your brand. We come up with creative, yet unexpected ways to combine brand experience with functionality.