Article SummaryAt HIMSS26, Surescripts stood out by creating a welcoming, café-style booth designed for comfort and connection rather than noise and spectacle. By prioritizing thoughtful design, open flow, and consistent hospitality programming, the booth fostered meaningful conversations and lasting relationships in a crowded and competitive environment.
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More than 24,000 healthcare and technology leaders descended on Las Vegas for HIMSS26: four days of programming across 600+ education sessions, 900+ exhibitors, and conversations about the future of healthcare ranging from AI in clinical workflows to cybersecurity frameworks to interoperability. It's the kind of event where it's easy to get lost in the noise, where booths compete for attention with massive digital displays and high-gloss product demos, and where the sheer scale can make meaningful connection feel like the hardest thing to accomplish.
Surescripts took a different approach entirely. Working with Skyline, they built a 40' x 40' exhibit that wasn't designed to shout — it was designed to welcome. And in a hall full of exhibitors vying for the next swipe of a badge scanner, the Surescripts booth became the place people actually wanted to be.
The tradeshow booth design conversation started not with aesthetics, but with intent. The goal was to create a place where customers, network alliance partners, and strategic partners could have real conversations without feeling rushed. They wanted space, comfort, and hospitality.
That insight drove every design decision. The result was a cafe-style exhibit featuring warm wood tones throughout: slatted wood ceiling panels, a rich walnut reception counter, and wood-framed feature walls that brought organic warmth into the convention hall. The Surescripts brand came through bold and clean: a backlit logo in the company's signature teal with the iconic arc motif, visible from across the aisle without overwhelming the space inside.
Circular LED pendant lights hung in clusters from the ceiling, casting warm light that reinforced the cafe atmosphere. A large orange canopy dome marked the interior lounge, giving the booth its own visual identity as a destination you could orient yourself toward from the show floor. Living planters at the base of columns softened the booth's perimeter and made the boundary between exhibit and aisle feel like an invitation rather than a barrier.
👉See more photos from the Surescripts booth at HIMSS26
One of the most deliberate aspects of the Surescripts booth design was what wasn't there. Rather than packing every square foot with demo stations and product walls, Skyline designed the space to breathe. Multiple entry points opened the booth from different angles, and the furniture (white swan chairs, woven lounge seating, small round cafe tables) was arranged to support organic movement and simultaneous conversations at different energy levels.
At any given moment, a one-on-one might be happening at a cafe table near the entrance, a small group gathered around the coffee bar, a partnership discussion taking place in a private meeting room toward the back. None of those conversations competed with each other.
That's not an accident. It's the result of treating spatial flow as a core feature of the design, not an afterthought.
The reception counter anchored the front of the booth with a curved, illuminated face bearing the Surescripts logo. A slatted wood feature wall framed an embedded display screen, delivering content without overwhelming the room. The overall effect was a space that felt purposefully calm in the middle of one of the healthcare industry's most frenetic events.
The physical design was only part of what made the Surescripts booth work. The other part was programming.
Every day of HIMSS26, Surescripts hosted happy hours in the booth, open to customers, network alliance partners, and prospective partners. Beverages, appetizers, and an open invitation kept the conversation going well past the typical activity window. At a conference where most exhibitors are shutting down at the end of official show hours, Surescripts leaned in.
The feedback was consistent and immediate. Customers and industry partners told the Surescripts team the same thing, repeatedly: you always have the best booth. We know we're going to feel at home here. We always look forward to coming back.
That kind of reputation doesn't come from a single clever design decision. It comes from treating hospitality not as a conference perk, but as an intentional relationship-building strategy; one executed year after year with enough consistency that attendees plan their HIMSS schedule around it.
HIMSS26's central themes of AI in healthcare operations, cybersecurity governance, interoperability, and digital transformation represented some of the most complex and consequential conversations happening in the industry. Surescripts, as a company at the center of healthcare data exchange and prescription connectivity, had every reason to anchor its booth presence to those conversations.
At a show where 900+ exhibitors are competing for the attention of 24,000 attendees, the booth that creates genuine comfort, and a reason to linger is the one that generates the most meaningful engagement. The Surescripts cafe-style environment didn't just attract visitors. It kept them there long enough for the real conversations to happen.
That's the kind of presence that translates directly into relationships. And in healthcare, where partnerships and trust take years to build, that matters more than any product demo.
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