51st Home and Outdoor Show held last week

The Johnson City Area Home Builders Association held its 51^st Home and Outdoor Show in ETSU’s Mini-Dome from Feb. 21 to 23.

Roughly 70 local and national companies exhibited over the weekend, and around 1,500 people attended the show. The show’s main theme was building and renovation, such as room additions, kitchen and bath remodeling, roofing, windows and doors and other products for the home and yard. The show also included craft and furniture vendors and recreation.  

Michael Garland, media past president of the JCAHBA and co-chair of the home and outdoor show committee, said the show has grown significantly over the years.

“We’ve expanded our footprint with a lot of different products,” said Garland. “There’s a lot to the show, so it has grown quite a bit over the years.”

Garland described the show as a very relationship-orientated event between consumers and business owners. He said the face-to-face interaction can seal the deal, and a lot of sales would be made throughout the weekend.

One of the show’s biggest features was “The Battle of the Build.” This is a competition between 13 local high schools, during which they design and build a project that is displayed, judged and awarded during the show. The projects are judged on five categories: presentation, build quality, finish quality, creativity and complexity. Attendees at the event can place a bid on a project that interests them through a silent auction process, all the proceeds of which go back to the participating schools.

The first place project takes home $1,000, second place wins $750 and third place wins $500. An additional popular vote award of $250 was also added this year, as well as the Chairman’s Choice Award, selected by the Chairman of the Board of the National Association of Home Builders. 

Garland said the Battle of the Build is a grassroots-level, workforce development campaign, and there is a high need for a workforce in the trades, which he hopes can come from high school students encouraged by the competition.  

“We’re very proud of the Battle of the Build,” said Garland. “We hope we’re doing our little part in our little part of Tennessee to initiate change and to bring a stronger, better prepared workforce into the residential construction industry.”