Expo Interactive Ecosystem – Case Study

CD-Log booth at HOTEX-KITEX 2025 with interactive touchscreen displays.

TL;DR

CD-Log exhibited at HOTEX-KITEX 2025 at Expo Tel Aviv. We needed (a) interactive touchscreen demos that would pull visitors into the booth, and (b) a faster way for sales reps to capture leads than paper. I scoped and built three web apps: a smart-home pantry simulation, a fully functional supermarket weighing station, and an internal lead-capture tool with Google Sheets as backend.

Context

CD-Log distributes commercial display hardware (touchscreens, signage) to retail and hospitality. The trade show was an opportunity to demonstrate the displays not as hardware but as a customer experience - "here's what your shoppers would actually do with it."

The problem

Static screens are forgettable. A display showing a slideshow doesn't pull visitors in. We needed interactivity.
Lead capture at trade shows is broken. Reps scribble on cards, lose them, transcribe poorly, and follow-up slips by days.
No off-the-shelf demo matched our pitch. We wanted to show specific use cases (a smart pantry inventory, a supermarket scale workflow) - generic vendor demos didn't communicate the right thing.

A display showing a slideshow doesn't pull visitors in. We needed interactivity.

The lead-capture problem at every trade show

Stakeholders & constraints

Stakeholders: Sales team (booth staff) · Marketing · Leadership

Key constraints: Hard deadline (show date doesn't move). Touch-first UX for 10" and 24" displays. Must work on flaky show-floor wifi. Zero-cost backend acceptable for demo-grade apps.

Approach & trade-offs

I scoped three separate apps because the alternative - one "everything" app - would have either compromised each use case or been too complex to ship in time.

Option	Approach	Verdict
Single app	One monolithic app covering all demos + lead capture	Rejected - too complex, and each screen serves for different use
Firebase backend	Proper database for lead capture with auth	Rejected - Sheets gave reps familiar follow-up surface
3 separate apps + Sheets	Each app scoped to one use case, Sheets as backend	Selected - ship fast, fit each screen size and use

The process

1. Use-case scoping with sales + marketing

Identified the two demo scenarios (smart pantry, weighing station) that best communicated CD-Log's value prop to trade show visitors.

2. UX design for touch-first

Designed all interactions for finger taps - large touch targets, no hover states, visual feedback on press. Tested on actual 10" , 24" and 27" display hardware.

3. Build & deploy

Built all three apps in 1 week. Deployed to Netlify for zero-downtime reliability. Lead capture app integrated with Google Sheets via Apps Script.

4. On-site QA & support

Present on the show floor for all 3 days. Fixed edge cases in real-time, observed visitor behavior, supported reps with the lead tool.

What I shipped

Three shipped apps: lead capture form, weighing station demo, smart home demo — Lead capture tool, Supermarket weighing station and Smart-Home simulation.

App	Purpose	Key feature
Smart Home Demo	Pantry inventory simulation (10" display)	Tap-to-add items, restock alerts
Weighing Station	Supermarket scale workflow (24" display)	Select produce, weigh, "print" barcode
Lead Collection	Internal tool for booth reps (27" display)	Name, phone, company, tags → Google Sheet

What I'd do differently

What I did

No auto-reset on demos. No "source demo" field in lead capture. No pre-show training for reps.

What I'd change

Add a reset timer to demos (avoid half-used state). Capture which demo each lead interacted with. Rehearse lead-capture flow with all reps the day before.

Skills demonstrated

Cross-functional shipping Hard-deadline delivery Pragmatic backend choice Touch-first UX On-site QA

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