Families with ASD

Families with ASD's Autism Expo History: 2006 to Present

When Julia and Greg Smith founded Families with ASD in 2005, they had no idea that their small autism support group would become the leading Autism Support Group in the Greater Cincinnati/ Northern Kentucky area. Their group quickly grew from 7 families at their first support group meeting on March 4, 2005 to today's amazing 500 plus families.

In the Spring of 2006, the Smith's autism support group was growing so quickly with newly diagnosed families, that they decided to put on a small information fair for families. They asked a couple of providers that worked with their son, Luke, if they would mind setting up a table of information so that the families in their support group could come and talk to them about what autism services they provide. "I remember when it first started," said Julia Ann Smith. "I asked Lisa and Scott Fox and Erin Hofmann, Founders of Kid Power Therapy Services, and Lukes' Sp/Ot therapists, if they would mind coming out for a meeting. They loved the idea which made us think to invite more service providers. The next thing I knew, I would come in from work and have several messages on my answering machine from providers I had never heard of asking if they could be part of our little event too.", said Smith. "I was shocked and very excited at how quickly it was growing."

The Smith's pushed back the date of the info fair to the last Saturday in September, so Julia had all summer to work on it. Julia is a full-time teacher and uses her summers and any free time she has to focus her energy on their autism support group. "Before Greg and I knew it, we had over 70 different organizations sign up for our event, " said Smith. "We didn't even have a registration form the first year, " said Greg Smith, Co-Founder of Families with ASD. "Julia had a notebook filled with post-its with every organization that called us asking to be part of this. She worked non-stop all summer organizing the event."

The Smith family was excited and hopeful that their event, now being called the Autism Expo, would have at least 300 families attend. They were shocked an amazed at how successful their event became. The Union-Township Fire Department that came out that day with their fire trucks and squad cars for the families to visit, estimated that the 2006 Autism Expo had over 2,200 people attend.

"It was wall to wall families, " said Alberta Mellon, Vice-President of Families with ASD. "We all were in shock at the turn out. Service Providers would come up to us and say they were out of all their materials. They were all excited too. We ran out of the Autism Yellow Pages© within the first 4 hours and had to make a waiting list for them. We were just so proud that our Expo helped reach so many families in need."

"We wanted a place for families to be able to come and get the information that they wanted/needed. The most important part of our Expo was that it had to be FREE to families, " said Julia Ann Smith. "We know how it is to struggle to make ends meet. When your child's much needed therapies are not covered by your family health insurance, and the co-payments for the many medications and doctor/hospital visits are so much, families don't have extra money to spend. That is why all our Autism Expo's are FREE. Families should not have to pay to help their child/adult with autism," said Smith.

While the annual Autism Expo may be FREE to families, it is a very costly annual event for Families with ASD. "We have to fundraise over $15,000 a year just to break even to pay for the expo expenses, " said Doug Blecher, President of Families with ASD. "Many do not know that the first Autism Expo was funded by Julia and Greg Smith's checking account. " Julia and Gregory Smith had applied for their non-profit status for Families with ASD back in February of 2006, but were still waiting on approval.

"We had received our tax-exempt number in April of 2006, so Greg and I took $200 from our checking account and opened the Families with ASD checking account, " said Smith. "To help pay for our event we had charged a registration fee for the providers and a fee for full and half-page advertisements in our Autism Yellow Pages© to help offset the cost. To be honest, we had no idea what we were doing, and we completely underchagred. Even after fundraising over $4,000 at the first Expo, we still were more than $2,000 in the red." said Smith. "It didn't matter though. We felt so good about what we were doing for families, we just decided we needed to increase our fundraising attemps to help us continue to help serve the families living with autism."

Since the huge success of the first Autism Expo in 2006, the Smith family and Families with ASD Board decided that the need for support and information was so great in their area, that they would make their Autism Expo an annual event. Families with ASD has now hosted 4 Autism Expo's over the past four years, and have had over 10,000 people attend their FREE one-day events! Since the success of their first Autism Expo, there have been many other Autism Expo's popping up all over the United States!

Families with ASD believes their Autism Expo's are so successful because they are FREE and open to everyone. "Families do not need to pay for the information or to register. All they have to do is drop in and enjoy. Our Autism Expo's are always full of FREE family autism friendly activities and FREE autism guest speakers. We have had families travel as far north as Maryland, and as far south as Florida to attend our yearly event," said Mellon.

If you are interested in attending a future Families with ASD's Autism Expo's here are some important things to remember.

The Autism Expo's are always held the last Saturday in September.
The Autism Expo's are always FREE to families and has a ton of free information, free family centered activities, and free guest speakers on autism.
Families do NOT need to register. It is drop in anytime during their event.
If you are an autism service provider or vendor, and are interested in setting up a table at their next Autism Expo, then please call the Autism Family Resource Center at 513-444-4979, or by E-mailing Julia Ann Smith at familieswithasd@yahoo.com and re: Autism Expo in the subject line. Service providers, and vendors must register. Early registration begins in April of each year, and no registrations will be taken after August 15th of each year. This allows Families with ASD enough time to plan the layout of their event.

If you would like to make a donation or sponsor our Annual Autism Expo, then please contact Families with ASD's President, Doug Blecher by calling the Autism Family Resource Center at 513-444-4979 or by E-mailing him at helpingfamilieswithautism@yahoo.com. Please Re: Sponsorship/Donation for Expo.

© 2005 - 2010 Families with ASD, Inc. Autism Yellow Pages, Autism Awareness Matters to Me design by Janis Hastings, and "I am an Adult with Autism" are trademarks owned by Families with ASD. All rights reserved.

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