Official Show Vendors

Be Warned Regarding Unofficial Vendors

Garden Center Conference & Expo participants have reported receiving solicitations from vendors NOT affiliated with Garden Center Conference & Expo specifically regarding hotel reservations and attendee list sales.

We urge all attendees to be especially diligent when engaging with any vendor who is not an official contractor of Garden Center Conference & Expo. Garden Center Conference & Expo vendors will never send emails from a non-business account such as Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook, etc.

Attendee Email List Scams

We would like to remind all attendees that the attendee mailing list for Garden Center Conference & Expo is not available publicly. Any solicitation claiming to have the email list of Garden Center Conference & Expo attendees, or attendee lists from any past Garden Center events, is fraudulent. Garden Center does not sell or rent the attendee email list.

Hotel Reservation Scams

Garden Center Conference & Expo has received reports from attendees who booked hotel rooms through various third parties only to subsequently learn that no reservations were in place and their deposits, along with full prepayment, were not returned.

Additionally, numerous convention bureaus are reporting hundreds of complaints from trade show managers who are receiving similar reports from event participants who booked rooms through a “third party room broker” and ended up at sold-out hotels with no reservations and no recourse for the payment of rooms. These brokers falsely imply they are affiliated with show management and secure deposits and/or full prepayment from attendees.

The official hotel reservation method for Garden Center Conference & Expo is directly through the group room block set up with Sheraton Kansas City at Crown Center. Garden Center Conference & Expo has no affiliation with any other room brokers. Reserving rooms directly through the Sheraton Kansas City at Crown Center is the only officially sanctioned method by Garden Center Conference & Expo to book hotel rooms on behalf of its attendees. You can book your hotel reservation here.

Below is a list of the Official Vendors of Garden Center Conference & Expo. If you do not see a vendor listed here and they claim to be an "official" vendor, please contact us immediately.

If you are approached by an external company offering any of the above services, or anything you are unsure of, please don’t purchase anything. Please contact our Conferences Division at conference@gie.net.