Learn<\/strong> Next up after the keynote speaker session was the workshop portion of the day. Each workshop was hosted by a\u00a0member of the Home Office and a panel of selected store owners, and owners could choose from three different topics relevant to their business. After a quick snack break (we love those) we finished off our “day of learning” with some roundtable sessions. There were 14 roundtables set up, and each table had a moderator who facilitated discussion around a certain topic. Store owners got to pick three topics they felt would be most useful and had 20 minutes at each table. Needless to say, we were quite exhausted by the end of that day!<\/p>\n Connect<\/strong> Store owners first get to reunite with each other at our welcome reception\u2014and at our Banquet\u00a0& Awards Ceremony\u00a0we invite all of the vendors who attend convention to join us as well. During dinner awards are given out to both vendors and store owners, and by the end of the evening you can find almost everyone tearing it up on the dance floor.<\/p>\n Play<\/strong> Stay tuned for next week\u2019s blog\u2014where we\u2019ll tell you all about the incredible donation our vendors made the Monroe Carroll Jr. Children\u2019s Hospital at Vanderbilt!<\/p>\n Talk to you again soon,<\/p>\n Kathryn\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Greetings, Learning Expressions Readers! I hope you all enjoyed your time off this week. I have to say the 4th\u00a0of July is one of my favorite holidays\u2014it doesn\u2019t get much better than sunshine, fireworks, and quality cookout time with the family.\u00a0 Here at Learning Express though, the week\u00a0before\u00a0the 4th\u00a0is also one of our favorite times…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2004","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-franchising"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pos.learningexpress.net\/franchise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pos.learningexpress.net\/franchise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pos.learningexpress.net\/franchise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pos.learningexpress.net\/franchise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pos.learningexpress.net\/franchise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2004"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pos.learningexpress.net\/franchise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2004\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pos.learningexpress.net\/franchise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pos.learningexpress.net\/franchise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pos.learningexpress.net\/franchise\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nEducation is a huge element of this annual get together. We kick off our first day at convention with small group training for our first year owners. They get to know each other a little better and pick up tips on buying, merchandising, marketing, and more.<\/p>\n![\"roundtable](\"https:\/\/fran.learningexpress.com\/wpi\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/943528_10151717992822094_1150415238_n-300x300.jpg\" "\\"roundtable")
The second day at convention we all gather together to hear from a selected keynote speaker. This year we were lucky enough to hear from Shep Hyken, who taught us about creating \u201cmoments of magic\u201d for our customers\u2014and even showed us a few magic tricks while he was at it!<\/p>\n
\n![\"Learning](\"https:\/\/fran.learningexpress.com\/wpi\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/photo-300x300.jpg\")
One of the very best parts about convention is the opportunity to connect with other members of the Learning Express Family.\u00a0In fact, our group is often mistaken for a family reunion rather than a business gathering!<\/p>\n
\n![\"Learning](\"https:\/\/fran.learningexpress.com\/wpi\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/1012323_10151721686137094_1693953397_n-300x300.jpg\")
Perhaps the most important aspect of the convention is giving our store owners the chance to play. Each year we hold a two day vendor expo and invite over 120 vendors to attend. It\u2019s exclusively for Learning Express franchisees, and it\u2019s here that our owners write their orders for all of their holiday season merchandise. Vendors display and demo their products, and it\u2019s a real opportunity for the store owners to play with the latest and greatest toys on the market. We also host a night called \u201cPowerPLAY\u201d which is a big hit every year. It\u2019s like speed dating, but with toys. Pretty great, right? Each vendor sets up at a table and has 10 minutes to show off their toy, craft, or game to a captive group of LE owners. There were 25 vendor tables this year, and each store owner could \u201cdate\u201d ten vendor tables total. I can say with certainty there were quite a few products our owners were in love with by the end of the evening!<\/p>\n