Trade show magician · Exhibition stands · Lead generation
You have paid for the space, the stand and three days of your team. The hard part is left: making visitors stop at yours rather than at the neighbour's. Hugo Marceau stops the aisle with close-up and branded iPad magic, in English and French, and passes each visitor to your people already open to a conversation.
In one paragraph
At a trade show the difficult thing is not convincing people. It is being noticed. A stand costs the space, the build, the logistics and several days of a team, and its return is measured in qualified contacts brought home, not in footfall in the aisle. A trade show magician turns an anonymous flow into conversations. Hugo Marceau works the edge of your stand with magic and mentalism, forms a crowd in seconds, puts your product inside the effect on an iPad, and introduces each visitor by name to one of your salespeople. The visitor arrives relaxed and curious; the commercial conversation starts on its own.
How it works on the stand
01 · Stop the aisle
From the edge of your stand, Hugo catches passers-by with a thirty-second effect. Three people laughing in front of your stand make the next ten slow down: in a hall where everything looks alike, a crowd is the signal that something is happening.
02 · Create the link
Close-up with cards, borrowed objects and a thought read in the aisle, or the branded iPad routine in which your logo and product come out of the screen. Long enough for the mood to change and the message to land, short enough to keep the aisle moving.
03 · Hand over
Hugo brings the visitor to the sales person you have chosen, by name, already smiling. A person introduced that way is not approached cold. Badge scan, QR code or appointment: the effect opens the door, your team keeps it open. The magician never replaces the team; he feeds it.
Two stands, as they happened
Global Industrie 2025 · Eurexpo Lyon
Guhring exhibited at Global Industrie in front of hurried buyers and engineers. Hugo worked the stand in strolling close-up, paired with one of their salespeople, mixing magic and mentalism: stop the passers-by, form the cluster, open the conversation, hand over. The stand did not empty at peak hours, and Guhring France went on to leave a Google review.
Lyon Motor Show · Eurexpo
Close-up on the Renault Pro stand for the whole day of the show, then a private evening for their clients at closing time. The same performer across the day and the evening is the format large exhibitors tend to choose: one brief, one contact, one thread from the aisle to the dinner.
In their words
"We were lucky enough to have Hugo Marceau at our company evening, and he was quite simply incredible. At ease with every guest, he captured everyone's attention and amazed them with his magic." Maéva, Guhring France, March 2025. "Hugo came to entertain a company event with almost two hundred people. Everyone was astonished." Violaine, March 2024.
Before the doors open
Which activation for a stand?
Where
Hugo is based in Lyon, where Eurexpo hosts Global Industrie, Sirha and Pollutec, and an hour from Geneva and Palexpo. Paris Nord Villepinte and the Porte de Versailles are two hours by train; the Cannes and Monaco show calendar is an hour by air. Exhibitions elsewhere in Europe are covered on request, with everything in cabin luggage. For the plenary, the networking break and the dinner of a convention, see conference entertainment; for the wider offer, corporate event entertainment; for tech audiences, the tech magician page.
Tailor-made for your stand
Fees on request. Every proposal is tailored to the number of days, the hours, the customisation and the travel involved.
Prefer to talk first? +33 6 88 61 29 00, WhatsApp welcome, English and French. Agencies: see the page for event planners.
Before you enquire
Three things, in order. He stops people in the aisle with a short effect that forms a crowd, because a crowd in an aisle makes the next visitors slow down. He holds the group for a few minutes of close-up or branded iPad magic, long enough for the mood to change and your product to enter the effect. Then he introduces each visitor by first name to one of your salespeople, who takes over a conversation that has already started. He does not replace your team; he feeds it.
Yes. On the iPad, your logo, your visuals and your product appear inside the effect, with a short script written around the message of the stand. In close-up, a prediction can reveal the name of the product or the offer. One rule: the magic never shows a feature the product does not have.
A half day or a full day, timed to the opening hours and the peaks: the opening, the lunch period and the late afternoon. Hugo alternates short performing sequences with pauses so that the energy holds across the whole day, and multi-day shows are quoted as such.
Before the doors open you agree who takes over, what makes a visitor worth the team's time and how the contact is recorded: badge scan, QR code, appointment in the diary. During the day Hugo brings the visitor to that person by name, already smiling. The effect opens the door; your team keeps it open.
Yes. The stand is worked in English and French, switching with each visitor, which suits the international shows at Eurexpo, Palexpo, Paris and Cannes. Mentalism needs no language at all: a thought read in the aisle is understood by everyone around it.
Fees are quoted on request and depend on the number of days, the hours, the customisation and the travel involved. A proposal within one business day, with one all-inclusive figure, timed to your peaks and written around what your sales team has to sell.
Hugo Marceau, mentalist and AI magician · Corporate event entertainment · iPad close-up · Tech magician · Experiential marketing · Conference entertainment · Performing worldwide · For event planners · Gala dinner entertainment · Corporate Christmas party entertainment · Corporate event host and compere · Corporate entertainment ideas