Jewish Unity Expo was a Vegas-style success
By Joel Goldenberg
The Suburban
The Montreal Jewish Unity Expo, bringing together 212 businesses and firms and thousands of attendees including Ensemble Montreal leader Soraya Martinez Ferrada for a day of networking, took place May 6 on Côte de Liesse Road in St. Laurent.
The event attracted a wide variety of companies, including real estate, sellers of cameras, power cleaning, 3D printing, a real estate virtual reality photographer, law firms like Choueke Hollander and Spiegel Ryan, mattress companies and many more.
Isaac Blackman, co-founder of the event with Martin Weiss, told The Suburban the expo was conceived six months ago and is the first such event at this scale — a previous event five years before had 30 booths.
“Fast forward, take a look around, at [about 1 p.m,], there were 3,688 people at this venue, and counting, thank God,” he said. “The concept of the event is supporting your fellow Jew, supporting another business, supporting another friend, bringing together every single community. Everyone is here to have a good time — network, support each other and walk out with connections.”
Blackman added that “everyone here so far, that I’ve heard, has built businesses, got contracts and leads. It’s amazing!”
Weiss, the co-founder of the event, said the original idea was that the “glue of the show was going to be real estate, that the exhibitors could talk to one another in that world.
“But we also expanded to have a little bit more fun, some food, some plant-based meat, things like that. But most of the show is real estate-based.”
The Suburban spoke with some of the exhibitors, and they were very pleased with how the event was proceeding.
Adam Spiro, who specializes in commercial restructuring and insolvency at the Spiegel Ryan law firm, said the firm decided to be part of the event as “we contribute to the Jewish community, we have a lot of Jewish clients, and wanted to be part of such a beautiful event!
“We couldn’t not be here. I met people I’ve spoken to on the phone a hundred times, and I met so many new people who will hopefully become clients, and hopefully friends too. I hope they do this event next year!”
Brian Breitstein of Wrap Demons, which transforms the look of vehicles with custom wraps as well as car colour changes and commercial vehicle graphics, said the event has been beneficial for the company.
“I’ve met a lot of people, I made a lot of contacts and a lot of people have taken my card, and I encountered a lot of businesses that need their trucks wrapped. There are more people here than I expected!”
Alina Tertychna of Groupe Monerix, an employment consultant, said “it’s a very nice event, lots of nice people and great information. Very useful!” n
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