Atlanta is about to host MHI's bi-annual trade show MODEX next week! But why should people get excited about this logistics & supply chain event?
Danny:
Hey, so next week there's a great trade show called MODEX, and we're going to be there. If you remember, we were there two years ago, and then last year we were at ProMat. And we're going to talk today about why I love MODEX!

Alright, so David is here again. Me, Danny. Awesome. We're super excited about it. So we have MODEX coming up next week. And this is from the association MHI, so Material Handling Institute puts on MODEX, the sister show of ProMat. So they alternate every two years. And so they do Atlanta, and then the following year it's ProMat in Chicago and then back to Atlanta. So we went two years ago when it was here in Atlanta just to kind of go check it out and do some interviews and just talk to some people, and it was awesome. It was really... We've been to several trade shows, but this was really cool for a couple reasons. And I know that I'm just super excited to go back.

I think a lot of people get a bad rep or manufacturing in particular kind of gets a little bit of a bad rep, or trade shows. And I think it's one of the reasons why the workforce development issue, the labor issues, the people, the younger generation doesn't want to work there, because they feel like, "Oh, it's grimy." I want to go work in a tech space, and somewhere innovative, and all that good stuff." And I think there's a major, not "I think," there is a major gap in that thought process, because when you go to a show like MODEX or ProMat it's innovation galore. It's amazing. It's really cool. I have a, really, a deep new appreciation for material handling space after going to the show, because what it really is, it's all material handling, supply chain, and a lot of automation and robotics. And the space is like, blowing up!

And when you think about it, why is it blowing up? Why is there so much innovation? Well, there's this company called Amazon. It's not because all of Amazon, right? But there's a lot that has to do with it, and it's... when we want to buy our things that we expect it super fast. Maybe as fast as an hour from now. We pull out a phone, we go on a thing, and boom, and in as early as an hour you could have your stuff at your door. That's pretty cool. Well, people are completely ignorant of the fact of what actually happens behind the scenes to make that thing happen. How do you get this cup made, manufactured somewhere, actually on your doorstep, is an incredible process. All the way from gathering the raw goods, to transporting them to a distribution facility, then it's going to a manufacturing plant, then it's actually processed, and then it's going out to another plant, then it's going to a retail location, and then, or an Uber, or if someone, here, delivers it to you. There's this whole lifecycle and that has gotten shorter and shorter and shorter and shorter and shorter, because we want things better, faster, cheaper.

And this show is really, I think, this peak of innovation that is happening to be able to make those dreams a reality. And what do I mean specifically by that? Like... you see... Well one of the things a lot of AGV, so Automatic Guided Vehicles, which is something that we've learned of the last several years. For, in layman's terms, robots. And AMRs right? But like, robots: moving around by themselves, picking up things, and doing... It's really cool. And it's helping to process things faster. Or picking and sorting. So they've got... Last year at ProMat we talked with Bastian Solutions.