Tilley Western, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

You need something to bring people over to the booth so you can have a conversation and perhaps create a sales opportunity.

In Florida shows, Alex would have a Hat floating in a plastic bowl of water. "Oh my gawd, it floats" was a quote used in signs of the day.

That evolved. Sometimes in a busy show, your eye on the public, the Hat sank! That was before floater panel days. I eventually had a 10 gallon fish tank with a floating Hat display, complete with water pump.

You can see water flowing out of the copper pipe down onto the Hat, the floating Hat below stuffed with Bud in aluminum beer cans, and the tin can of Kokanee beer sitting on the bottom of the fish tank which fooled the viewer into thinking the floating Tilley Hat was holding up the beer.

It was an eye-catching display. John usually explained that aluminum beer cans float anyway, and that in the old days of non-floating tin beer cans Canadians had a real dilemma when the canoe flipped over: the beer or the wife?

At one show, the night security guard drank my Kokanee, leaving cash in the empty can, and me without a display. I had a backup beer!