As at every Partner Tour event, ScanSource brought together local vendors, ISVs and reseller partners to enjoy a day full of great opportunities for networking and the possibility to learn all about recent ScanSource initiatives.
Resellers were also able to discover vendors’ latest offerings, including Honeywell’s Dolphin 6000 scanphone, a multi-purpose all-in-one device which created a lot of buzz around the Honeywell exhibition booth; Intermec’s latest ScanSource-exclusive incentive and growth-support campaign, the Big 5; as well as products yet to be released, such as the new ET1, Motorola’s first Android-based tablet built for enterprise users which will be available to resellers from ScanSource early in 2012.
This year the Partner Tour visited eight countries, with the other seven destinations being the Netherlands, Poland, UK, Italy, Sweden, France and Germany. Once again, the format of the Partner Tour proved popular with ScanSource hosting over 1,500 people from the channel for the second consecutive year.
The UK Partner Tour was held in London in June where 350 attendees from the Auto ID and Comms channels were welcomed to Vinopolis near Southwark Cathedral. Located right next to the river Thames, and set under the soaring arches of a former railway Viaduct, Vinopolis proved to be an ideal setting for ScanSource to engage locally with resellers, raise awareness of its programmes and show resellers how use them to the benefit of their business.
“The key to the Partner Tour is the opportunity it creates to bring the channel together,” said Emma Edwards, Sales Manager UK & Ireland, ScanSource Europe. “It saves on the huge investments in time and travel that would usually be required for resellers and vendors to establish that many contacts. ScanSource is doing what a value added distributor should: we’re making it easier to do business.”
“The Partner Tour events provide great opportunities for resellers, but there are plenty of benefits for vendors too,” said Bert Fonderie, Vice President of Merchandising, ScanSource Europe. “They have a unique chance to display their products, raise awareness of their brand and get to know the people and the requirements of the people that are actually buying their products.”
“We really do our best to make these days memorable for our partners,” said Kim Jennings, Sales Manager, ScanSource Communications Europe. “But we don’t forget what’s important: with resellers, local vendor representatives and the local ScanSource team all together in the same place at the same time, combined with the special attention given to education, resellers get hands-on knowledge and advice, while relationships are built, strengthened and developed that help everyone to grow their business.”