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Photo of Aaron Levant courtesy of Agenda.

Founder of Agenda Aaron Levant will be leaving the trade show and its parent company, Reed Exhibitions, to pursue other entrepreneurial endeavors, Apparel News reported earlier this month. Since Levant founded the streetwear-forward trade show in 2003, Agenda has become the biannual Las Vegas and Long Beach display for more than 1,000 established and emerging lifestyle brands.

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Levant was a forward-thinking leader in the industry. While browsing the convention floor had traditionally been an exclusive activity for buyers, it was just last summer the inaugural Agenda Festival brought over 15,000 fans and consumers to the Long Beach Convention and Entertainment Center to shop and see Tyler, the Creator, Ludacris, Cam’ron, Taco and Lil Dicky perform with a surprise appearance from ASAP Rocky. The decision to create a third day for consumers was Levant’s.

 

Levant told Apparel News that becoming “the CEO of a major trade-show conglomerate” isn’t the first item on his to-do list. In an effort to find a new challenge, he stated, “Now I’m going to start from the ground up with something new.”

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Agenda Winter 2018. Photo by Asia Morris.

Agenda’s office will remain based in Los Angeles and, until a new group leader is hired, the team will continue to report to Hervé Sedky, Reed’s regional president of its Americas division, according to Apparel News. Levant is expected to officially leave at the end of February.

Levant also started ComplexCon, which albeit mixed feelings about its growth from major brand starters like Bobby Hundreds, made more than $20 million for exhibitors and brought 50,000 attendees to Long Beach during its second year at the convention center, according to Apparel News.

 

In a separate story which included perspectives from Agenda vendors, trade show veteran Jeff Staple said it would be up to the organization to continue in Levant’s footsteps.

“Aaron had all of the relationships and the vision,” Staple told Apparel News. “The onus is on Agenda, the organization, to show that it cares more than Aaron. That will be the challenge. He put his head on the rails for this.”

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Staple Pigeon at Agenda Show in January. Photo by Asia Morris.

Requests for comment from Agenda went unanswered.

Learn more about Agenda via the website here. 

Asia Morris is a Long Beach native covering arts and culture for the Long Beach Post. You can reach her @hugelandmass on Twitter and Instagram and at [email protected].