Mr. Pugh has twenty years experience in creating and running successful trade shows and conferences in a wide variety of markets. His career began in 1980 as founding publisher of Photo District News (PDN), which remains the nation’s leading trade journal for professional photographers. Shortly thereafter he launched PHOTO EXPO, which also maintains a leadership role in the same field. Both were sold to ADWEEK in 1985, just before Pugh became a partner and CEO of Conference Management Corporation (CMC), then one of America’s largest independent trade show producers.

In 1991, Mr. Pugh left CMC and became president of Cowles Event Management (now part of Primedia), building that group into the leading producer of marketing and media related events. In 1995 he joined Mecklermedia, as president of its events group, helping to grow the wildly successful Internet World franchise and a suite of related high-tech events. At its peak, Internet World attracted 125,000 participants and 750,000 net sqft of exhibits annually. Penton acquired Mecklermedia in 1998 and Mr. Pugh was appointed president of Penton’s Technology Events Group, where he has served for the past five years.

"My staff and I have several core strengths, which we believe offer considerable benefit to our partners," stated Pugh. "The first is our extensive experience working on a joint-venture basis with trade magazines and associations to successfully launch new events. The second is our strong emphasis on high quality conference content as the cornerstone of each show. We will support that with superlative customer service, attention to every detail and a practiced understanding of what makes an event really sing to ensure financial and artistic success in most any event marketplace we enter."

Mr. Pugh serves on the board of directors of the Society of Independent Show Organizers (SISO), where he is also chairman of the education committee.