Rosemont, Illinois:
This may be the only place in the country where, for two days at least, the prospect of a bedbug infestation carries not the slightest, slimmest of stigmas.
Vendors from all over the country, including Warrick Bell, left, and Brian Hirsch with Protect-A-Bed, converged on the Hyatt Rosemont hotel in Rosemont, Illinois, for a conference that focused on battling bedbugs.
The gathering drew more than 360 entomologists; pest control workers; government, military and university officials; and inventors of anti-bedbug contraptions.
At a meeting here this week, a line of salespeople wore green hardhats decorated with large black bugs, red tongues protruding and legs wiggling, as they spoke about the urgent need to protect mattresses.
Not far from various heating, freezing, dusting and spraying devices aimed at abolishing the creatures were stuffed, pastel-colored bedbugs. All around were films, charts and blown-up photographs of the bugs themselves -- the enemies (and stars) of this show.
More than 360 concerned people -- entomologists; pest control workers; government, military and university officials; and, especially, inventors of anti-bedbug contraptions -- gathered here in the Chicago suburbs on Tuesday and Wednesday for the event, which had a growing waiting list of more than 200 people.
"I can give you back your life in a day," one pest control company owner, Scott Linde of Edison, N.J., said as he pointed a visitor toward a room full of heaters and computerized heat monitors, all aimed at eviscerating bedbugs in a matter of hours.
"People still have in their heads that bedbugs means someone's dirty," Mr. Linde said, "but I handle multimillion-dollar homes in Westchester and Connecticut, and believe me, no one's dirty."
Phillip Cooper, an organizer of the conference who proudly wore his BedBug Central company logo shirt, said this was the biggest, broadest meeting of its kind since bedbugs began making their miserable return. The price tag for attendees: $450.
Mr. Cooper's brother, Richard, an entomologist he calls "the god of bedbugs," had warned for years that they were returning and helped create BedBug Central, a company that sells "boot camp" training to pest control companies and produces regular "BedBug TV" Webcasts on the latest woes.
"This isn't going away," Mr. Cooper said of the insects, pointing out that nearly all interested parties besides the hotel industry had chosen to be represented at the conference.
The seminars, which drew standing-room-only crowds, were not meant for those with a passing interest or for those quick to cringe (or itch). Among the topics: "Bring the Heat," "Fumigation" and "Group Homes -- Unique Challenges in Transient Settings."
In the hallways, the ordinary pleasantries sounded anything but ordinary. Some people shared suggestions on how best to check beds, mattresses and sheets for bedbugs.
(Nearly everyone said they had done as much when they arrived at the host hotel, and the maids may find more than a few headboards askew from their search. Many people said they started out by putting luggage on the bathroom floor, the better to see any scurrying, before investigating hiding spots in the rest of the room. One man put his luggage inside a bedbug-proof bag and kept all his clothes on a non-fabric chair throughout his stay, though his initial survey found nothing.)
A few attendees debated chemical solutions versus heat, whose supporters said it was generally more expensive but required fewer treatments. Others traded tales of their most challenging infestations.
"You got a popcorn ceiling? You're dead," said Kristine Effaldana, who owns dogs trained to search for bedbugs, including Walter, a puggle who sat at her feet looking mildly puzzled in the crowd. She was referring to the sprayed-on texture that was in style 40 years ago and can be a breeding ground for bugs.
If anything, the products promoted revealed that there is, for now, no single, agreed-on answer to the problem. The sheer number of them is enormous and growing by the week: dissolving laundry bags, plastic luggage protectors, screw-in bug barriers for the bottoms of bed legs, slow-release strips meant to vaporize bugs, portable aerosol machines and on and on.
Many grumbled about newcomers to the battle and about products that promised to do everything at little cost. "There are so many pest control places out there showing up and undercutting," said Corey Westrum of Leonard, Minn., who helped create Insect Inferno, a portable trailer that heats mattresses.
Of course, no one seems to agree yet on exactly who is legitimate and who is, in the words of Brian Hirsch, a sales manager for Protect-A-Bed, "a Johnny-come-lately." Even the organizers of this event said they were not necessarily endorsing those who had chosen to display their goods.
One absolute message here: there is no shame in bedbugs. It is not you. It is them. Still, there were acknowledgments of how the rest of the country may feel.
At the booth of USBedBugs.com, the company's sign promised "discreet home delivery," which workers there said meant that items like travel sprays and large plastic bags would arrive in plain brown boxes with no company name on the return address.