Early this morning the five RAN staff (and Global Exchange campaigner Nick) who are in LA for the “Triple Crown” week of actions got out of bed and headed to Long Beach to greet Weyerhaeuser at the 2007 Building Industry Show.

Building conferences and shows happen fairly regularly around the country and serve as a showcase for companies hoping to expand their reach in the industry. These events are great opportunities to put Weyerhaeuser on the spot for for their destructive logging practices and disregard for human rights. Weyerhaeuser was there to promote it’s iLevel brand, which are engineered wood products that are constructed from trees coming directly out of Grassy Narrows despite protests from the community. We were ready to embarrass Weyerhaeuser in front of their peers in the building industry and to deliver the message once again that they need to immediately pull their operations out of Grassy Narrows traditional territory and stop profiting from stolen wood.

We arrived at the Long Beach convention center before most of the builders themselves and staked out the conference center for our impending actions. As the show opened its doors, we met scads of builders just outside the entrance. By mid-morning all 1000 of our flyers were in the hands of every builder within 100 miles of Long Beach.

Meantime, in a parking-lot around the corner, we furiously filled dozens of balloons with helium for our banner. Our plan was to release a “balloon banner” inside of the conference center that read: “iLevel by Weyerhaeuser - Clearcutting Human Rights - Ask Us How! Booth 229.”

Nick made the first noble effort to release the balloons and the attached banner. With the banner safely hidden in a “gift” bag and big bunches of balloons overhead, he entered the conference lobby like he owned the place. Security was on the ready and expecting trouble. They showed Nick the door before he could deliver his precious cargo.

Miraculously, the banner still made it inside. Nick handed the balloons off to Julie and her wingmen, incredible RAN volunteers, Wendell and David. Just minutes after the first attempt, the threesome managed to bring the very same banner (without the bag) back into the very same lobby with the very same security—and release the banner up to the ceiling. Unfortunately, the building security caught on and quickly escorted everyone outside before we could capture great pictures.

By noon, it’s safe to say that EVERYBODY knew that there was trouble with iLevel and Weyerhaueser. Mission accomplished.