A 10x10 booth costs $1,500-$5,000 as a pop-up kit, $5,500-$15,000 as a modular rental ($55-$150 per square foot), or $12,500-$32,500+ as a custom rental ($125-$325 per square foot). But the number that belongs in your budget is bigger: add floor space, shipping and drayage, install-and-dismantle labor, show services, and staff travel, and a typical 10x10 participation runs about $20,000 all-in — with the booth structure itself accounting for under half the bill. Here's every line, priced, plus the rent-vs-buy math.
| Booth type | Pricing basis | 10x10 | 20x20 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pop-up / portable kit | Flat kit | $1,500 – $5,000 | 2-4 kits, ~$5k-$15k |
| Modular rental | $55 – $150/sq ft | $5,500 – $15,000 | $22,000 – $60,000 |
| Custom rental | $125 – $325+/sq ft | $12,500 – $32,500 | $50,000 – $130,000 |
| Custom build (purchase) | $200 – $325+/sq ft | often $300+ on small footprints | $80,000 – $130,000+ |
Why the spread? Modular rental parts are standard aluminum-and-fabric systems an exhibit house re-rents all season. Custom rentals dress the same bones in bespoke graphics and components. Custom builds are manufactured for you alone — and smaller booths often clear $300 per square foot because design and engineering costs spread across less floor. These are 2025-26 industry budgeting bands from exhibit-house and general-contractor pricing (GES and peers publish budgeting guidance); your real number comes from three quotes.
The stack that surprises first-timers, roughly in order of pain:
Rent when you exhibit fewer than three or four times a year, when the footprint changes show to show, or when you're testing a market — no storage fees, no refurbishment, no disposal, and the exhibit house re-graphs last year's rental for a fraction of a rebuild. Buy when the calendar is dense and the brand is stable: a $3,000 pop-up pays back in two shows against rental fees, and a $25,000 custom build breaks even against $8,000-$10,000 rentals by show three. The hidden cost of ownership is custody — climate-controlled storage runs $100-$300 a month for crate-sized booths, plus refurb and repair between shows.
One honest note on the custom-build pitch: exhibit houses amortize beautifully on paper, "six shows a year for five years," but branding refreshes, acquisitions, and product pivots kill most builds before year four. Rent the bones, own the graphics, and let the strategy mature before you buy hardware.
Scale the math. A 20x20 island at modular-rental rates is $22,000-$60,000 for the structure, $12,000-$60,000 for space depending on the show, and bigger drayage, rigging, utilities, and crew lines. Realistic total participation lands in the $75,000-$150,000 range — which is why island real estate is where exhibit houses earn their fees, and why the corporate event budget calculator and the hotel room block calculator belong in the same spreadsheet as your booth math. If you're staffing a full program, the same per-person-day travel logic prices the crew either way.
The structure: $1,500-$5,000 for a pop-up kit, $5,500-$15,000 for a modular rental ($55-$150/sq ft), $12,500-$32,500+ for a custom rental ($125-$325/sq ft). The show: floor space often $10,000-$15,000 at flagship events, plus shipping, drayage, labor, utilities, and travel. A typical 10x10 participation budgets around $20,000 all-in.
Modular rentals run $22,000-$60,000 for 400 square feet, custom rentals $50,000-$130,000, and purchased custom builds $80,000-$130,000+. Island booths (20x20 and larger) also carry rigging, larger utilities, and more staff — total participation for a serious 20x20 commonly lands in the $75,000-$150,000 range.
Drayage is the general contractor's mandatory material handling — dock to booth space and back — billed by weight at roughly $75-$130 per hundredweight with surcharges for carpet, pad-wrapped, or suspended items. You can't opt out at union venues, and heavy custom booths pay for it twice: once to the show floor and once to storage. Lightweight modular designs exist partly to cut this line.
Roughly three or four. A $3,000 pop-up pays for itself in two shows against rental fees; a $25,000 custom build breaks even against $8,000-$10,000 rentals in about three shows — if your footprint, branding, and storage plan stay stable. If the calendar is thin or the strategy is still moving, renting keeps you flexible and storage-free.