To the SPX Community,
This email is to inform all of you of the facts surrounding the current circumstance at the Montgomery County Conference Center, where SPX is held every year.
We hope this makes clear SPX's position on this delicate issue and if you have any questions, please send them to exhibitor-inquiries@smallpressexpo.com.
Signed, The SPX Executive Committee
WHAT HAS HAPPENED
- In the spring of 2025, Montgomery County and the Marriott signed a contract to continue their operating agreement (Montgomery County owns the Conference Center and Marriott manages the facility). That new contract did not include a clause to allow collective bargaining.
- UNITE-HERE Local 25, the union of hotel, restaurant, and casino workers in the DC area, called for a boycott to protest the omission of the collective bargaining clause in the Conference Center contract.
- The hotel is not part of this action by Local 25, so people can stay at the hotel without violating the boycott.
- In late July, the boycott was elevated to nationwide status by the AFL-CIO.
- There is no strike by the staff of the Conference Center and there are no collective labor issues under discussion between that staff and Marriott management.
SPX's POSITION
The Small Press Expo is a 501(c) 3 non-profit that has been an institution in Montgomery County, Maryland for more than 30 years, drawing tens of thousands of people and international acclaim via our annual festival. For the last 20 of those years, we have been holding SPX at the Bethesda North Marriott Hotel & Conference Center, and we now consider it our home.
Our purpose throughout that time has never wavered. We exist to promote, preserve, and protect the labor of creative professionals. SPX further supports the right of all workers to exercise their fundamental right to organize, bargain collectively, and advocate for fair treatment. The ability of working people to act together is a cornerstone of a fair and equitable workplace.
At the same time, we want to be transparent about our own circumstances that do now allow us to participate in the boycott:
- SPX has contracts at the Bethesda North facility from this year until 2029. If we cancel any one of those contracts, SPX does not have the financial resources to cover the cancellation fees that we would incur. The result of canceling any of the contracts, including the one for this year whose cancellation fee is $85,787, would be that SPX closes permanently.
- Even if the cancellation penalties were to be paid, our show cannot relocate to another venue in the DC area. We have explored this possibility and relocating would mean a prohibitively large increase of 30% or more in prices for tables, badges, and hotel rooms; which would affect the overall affordability of the show to the SPX Community.
We recognize that some will be disappointed by that decision, but we believe it is important to be honest about the commitments we have already made rather than imply we can take actions that are not realistically available to us.
Our inability to join this particular boycott should not be understood as indifference to the issues at stake. Montgomery County is our home and we wish to see it prosper for those who live and work here every day. We continue to support the rights of workers to organize and to seek fair wages, safe working conditions, and dignity on the job, and we hope the parties are able to reach a fair agreement as quickly as possible.
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