For the 2,300 some industry professionals who attended Nacha’s Smarter Faster Payments conference this week, there was some fun intermingled with the riveting content.
On the exhibit hall floor, packed with about 100 booths, the competition to attract attention was intense. Swag, games and entertainment all played a role in the friendly jousting. It was a “very creative” bunch this year, said Dan Roth, a spokesperson for Nacha who provided the conference statistics.
At the Visa station, there was an industrial grade sewing machine stitching requested initials onto blue baseball caps matching the color of the card network’s logo. Another exhibitor offered backpacks emblazoned with logos like the “Fraud Fighter” and “I [heart] AML.”
More mundane freebies included spongy dolls, stylin’ water bottles and Teddy bears for the taking, to be delivered to family members not lucky enough to spend a few days in sunny downtown San Diego.
Aside from booty, there was entertainment too. The fraud whack-a-mole game offered by startup Q2 Software broke attendees out of their conference funk with a large fuzzy hammer to pound pesky fraud varmints popping up. There was also the Pirates Chest glass box filled with prizes to be plucked with an electronic pincher arm.
For thirsty conference-goers, a stationary bike at the Volante Technologies booth let them spin to blend their own smoothies. On the opposite of the trade floor were flavored lattes dispensed from Finastra’s shiny vintage coffee urn. The line for coffee was particularly long in the afternoon, when people needed an extra shot of caffeine to sit through a few more sessions, perhaps after a late night at one of the several conference receptions.
Nacha, The Clearing House, the Federal Reserve and other industry groups stepped up to host networking events and evening soirees for the conference participants.
The Fed feted a group at the Omni San Diego Hotel at the Ballpark with an “industry appreciation” poolside event. Others may have headed next door to the stadium to see the San Diego Padres lose to the Arizona Diamondbacks at Petco Park.
The bash put on by the bank-owned TCH offered a California sunset view from the Portside Pier on Harbor Drive.
On the final night of the conference, the payments aficionados were invited to the U.S.S. Midway, an aircraft carrier museum floating in the city’s harbor. That bon voyage for the conference gave industry peers one last time to see each other strolling through historic aircraft.
Next year, when the conference moves to Washington, there will be plenty of other historic locations to mix and mingle.
