If you are exhibiting at PPAI Expo, you are exhibiting at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center January 12–14, 2027, with PPAI Advance education on January 11, alongside more than 1,000 exhibiting companies showing 250,000-plus products across roughly a million square feet. Las Vegas Exhibit House designs, rents, builds, ships, installs and dismantles the exhibit that has to hold up in that room.
PPAI Expo is organized by Promotional Products Association International and runs January 12–14, 2027, with PPAI Advance education on January 11 at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center. Dates confirmed with the organizer. We are an exhibit house, not a broker: our own facility is here in Las Vegas, so the exhibit you rent for PPAI ships across town instead of across the country, and the crew that installs it works this building all year.
How the PPAI floor rewards an exhibit
PPAI is a product show, not a story show. Buyers want to pick things up, and the booths that work turn the backwall into shelving and the counters into sampling surfaces rather than saving the space for a brand statement.
There is a real difference between an exhibit designed for PPAI and a generic exhibit shipped to PPAI. We see the second kind on this floor every year. We would rather build you the first.
Moving into Mandalay Bay Convention Center for PPAI
The Mandalay Bay Convention Center holds 2,100,000 square feet, opened in 2003 at 1.5 million square feet and expanded in 2015 with another 350,000 square feet of exhibit space, plus the 70,000-square-foot Oceanside Ballroom added on the second floor in 2016.
Sample volume is the logistics problem nobody plans for. Cases of product arrive separately from the exhibit, need locked overnight storage, and have to be merchandised and restocked daily, so the booth needs a real closet and not a curtain.
Ceiling heights differ between the original halls, the 2015 expansion and the ballroom levels, so confirm the rigging height and hang points for your assigned room before a hanging sign is fabricated. The building divides into 75 separate rooms across three floors with three catering kitchens, so a Mandalay Bay footprint is often split between a hall floor and a ballroom level, and each level has its own freight path and its own delivery deadline.
Teamsters jurisdiction over material handling and prefabricated exhibit install and dismantle applies at Mandalay Bay as it does across Las Vegas, with the show's general contractor publishing the specific rules per event. South-end Strip location means freight routing comes in off Russell Road rather than fighting mid-Strip traffic.
Booth sizes we rent for PPAI
We rent every standard footprint for PPAI Expo, and every one of them can carry your graphics, your product, your LED content and your meeting space:
10x10 exhibit rental — 100 square feet. An inline space where the backwall is the entire brand statement and the counter has to do double duty as demo surface and storage.
10x20 exhibit rental — 200 square feet. The most common inline upgrade, with room for a demo station on one side and a seated conversation on the other.
10x30 exhibit rental — 300 square feet. A long inline run that lets you sequence the visit — attract, demonstrate, then close — along the aisle.
20x20 exhibit rental — 400 square feet. The first true island, open on four sides, where the center structure carries the brand and the corners carry the conversations.
20x30 exhibit rental — 600 square feet. An island with enough depth for an enclosed meeting room without giving up the open corners.
20x40 exhibit rental — 800 square feet. Room for a full demonstration theater plus private meeting space on the same footprint.
30x30 exhibit rental — 900 square feet. A square island that reads from every aisle, typically built around a central tower and a hanging sign.
30x40 exhibit rental — 1,200 square feet. A major presence with separate zones for demonstration, hospitality and closed-door meetings.
40x40 exhibit rental — 1,600 square feet. A headline footprint where structure, rigging and labor planning become as important as the design.
Custom builds, double-deck structures and LED-led designs are all available for PPAI as well. If your space is an odd shape or an odd size, we build to it rather than forcing a stock kit into it.
The person you are actually designing for
Distributors walking PPAI are writing orders on the floor and comparing decoration methods side by side. Clear price points, decoration samples and a place to sit and write are worth more than a video wall.
Frequently asked questions about exhibiting at PPAI Expo
Can I rent a trade show exhibit for PPAI Expo instead of buying one?
Yes, and for most PPAI exhibitors renting is the better decision. A rental exhibit gives you the same finished appearance as a purchased booth without the capital outlay, the storage cost between shows or the refurbishment bill when the design ages. You get new graphics every time, you can change footprint from one year to the next, and the crate never sits in a warehouse you are paying for. We rent everything from a 10x10 inline to a 40x40 island for PPAI Expo, and the rental includes the structure, the graphics, the delivery to Mandalay Bay Convention Center, the installation, the dismantle and the return.
How much does a trade show booth cost at PPAI Expo?
The honest answer is that the exhibit is one line of five. Budget for the space you bought from Promotional Products Association International, the exhibit itself, the graphics, the material handling and drayage, and the labor to install and dismantle it at Mandalay Bay Convention Center. A 10x10 rental with graphics lands in a very different range than a 20x20 island with LED and a hanging sign, and Las Vegas labor rates and drayage move the total more than most exhibitors expect. We quote all five lines together so you see the real number before you commit, not after the show services invoice arrives.
How far in advance do I need to book an exhibit for PPAI Expo?
Book as early as you can, and at minimum work backward from the deadlines rather than forward from today. Graphics need artwork approval before output, freight needs a targeted move-in window, rigging and electrical orders carry discount deadlines that close weeks ahead, and hanging signs at Mandalay Bay Convention Center need approved drawings. Exhibitors who come to us three or four months out get the best result and the best price. We take projects much later than that and still deliver, but late work costs more because everything moves to expedited rates.
Do you handle installation and dismantle at Mandalay Bay Convention Center?
Yes. Teamsters jurisdiction over material handling and prefabricated exhibit install and dismantle applies at Mandalay Bay as it does across Las Vegas, with the show's general contractor publishing the specific rules per event. We coordinate the labor call, supervise the install, stay reachable through show days and handle the dismantle and return freight. You do not need to be in the hall at 6 a.m. watching a crate get opened.
We are shipping from out of state. How does freight to PPAI Expo work?
Most exhibitors ship either to the advance warehouse or direct to show site, and the right choice depends on your move-in date and your tolerance for risk. Advance warehouse shipping gets the crate into Las Vegas early and delivered to your space by the general contractor; direct-to-show requires hitting a targeted window at Mandalay Bay Convention Center, and missing it is expensive. Either way, material handling is charged by weight and it is one of the largest and least-predicted lines on a show budget. We plan the route, the packaging and the weight with that in mind, and if you rent from us the freight originates here in Las Vegas and a lot of that cost disappears.
Start the PPAI exhibit plan
Send us your space size, your booth number and your goal for the show. You will get a design direction and a single quote covering exhibit, graphics, freight, install, dismantle and show services, from a team whose warehouse is in this city.
Call (702) 760-4036 or start a quote. Las Vegas Exhibit House — trade show exhibit rentals, custom exhibits, graphics, LED, freight, installation and dismantle, from a Las Vegas facility, since 2014.