Stova alternatives for trade show and expo organizers
Stova (the 2022 merger of Meetingplay, Aventri and eventcore) is a broad enterprise events suite closer in scope to Cvent than to a floor-plan specialist. Here's where that breadth helps, and where it costs more than an organizer selling booth space actually needs.
For organizers whose event revenue comes from booth and sponsorship sales, Map D is the more focused, more affordably transparent choice. For programs that need integrated venue sourcing and hotel room-block negotiation, deep attendee engagement tooling, and one vendor across many event formats, Stova's enterprise suite is a legitimate fit.
Written by Map D, which is one of the alternatives listed below. Claims about other platforms are limited to what those companies publish themselves, and each is sourced at the foot of the page. Last verified September 2026.
Published, per event
Stova
Adding organizers or exhibitors does not change the plan price.
Trusted by leading associations
What Stova is good at
Stova inherited real depth from Meetingplay, Aventri and eventcore, and it shows in a few areas most floor-plan-first platforms don't touch at all.
- Built-in venue sourcing and hotel RFP tooling — access to 225,000+ venues and an eRFP builder for comparing bids, on Stova's own site — a capability Map D does not attempt.
- A broad attendee-engagement stack: AI matchmaking, live chat, polls and gamification, plus virtual/hybrid streaming for programs that go beyond an in-person floor.
- Publishes starting prices for three packages (Core, Pro, Enterprise) on its own site, which is more transparent than most enterprise-suite competitors that only offer a quote.
- Serves 800+ organizations across large corporate and association programs, per its own site, suited to teams standardizing on one vendor across many event types.
Why organizers look elsewhere
The gaps that send trade show organizers looking for an alternative.
- The published prices are starting points, not fixed rates: Stova's own packages page lists Core at $1,995, Pro at $5,995 and Enterprise at $12,995, each plus a starting per-registration fee of $3.00–$5.60 — and the same page states pricing 'may be reviewed based on event volume, contract length or specific requirements.' A per-registration fee also means cost rises with attendance in a way a flat per-event price does not.
- The platform is built around the broader meetings and events lifecycle — registration, agendas, engagement, venue sourcing — more than around selling and managing trade-show floor inventory. We did not find a documented, live interactive booth floor plan comparable to a trade-show map on Stova's own product pages.
- Three legacy products (Meetingplay, Aventri, eventcore) were merged into one platform in 2022; depending on which one your event historically ran on, migrating internally can carry its own friction even before comparing to an outside vendor.
How Map D compares
Map D’s column states what Map D does. Where a Stova equivalent is not publicly documented, the row says so rather than guessing.
- Map D offers
- 6 of 7
- Stova publicly documents
- 5 of 7
The second bar counts what Stova documents on its own site, which is not the same as what it can do. A criterion we could not verify is shown as unverified, not as missing — if Stova covers it somewhere we did not find, that is a gap in our checking rather than in their product.
| Criterion | Map D | Stova |
|---|---|---|
| Published pricing | Included | Documented |
| Pricing unit | Included | Documented |
| Interactive floor plan with live booth inventory | Included | Unverified |
| Self-serve booth and sponsorship checkout | Included | Unverified |
| Exhibitor self-service portal | Included | Documented |
| Registration, badging and lead retrieval | Included | Documented |
| Venue sourcing and hotel room-block management | Not offered | Documented |
$1,500
$2,500
$2,750
—
Map D’s rates are per event and listed on the pricing page. The dashed column has no height and no figure on purpose: where rates are not published we will not put a number on them, and where they are published we will not restate one that can change without notice.
Criterion by criterion
| Criterion | Map D | Stova |
|---|---|---|
| Published pricing | Yes — $1,500, $2,500 and $2,750 per event, flat, listed on the pricing page. | Stova publishes starting prices at stova.io/packages/ — Core $1,995+, Pro $5,995+, Enterprise $12,995+ — but the same page says pricing may be adjusted based on volume, contract length or requirements (checked September 2026). |
| Pricing unit | Per event, flat. Adding organizers or exhibitors does not change the plan price. | Stova charges a package base fee plus a starting per-registration fee ($3.00–$5.60 depending on tier), so total cost scales with attendance (checked September 2026). |
| Interactive floor plan with live booth inventory | Core to the product — booth availability, pricing and sales run off the same live plan. | Stova's platform pages describe a seating plan manager and room/resource inventory, but we found no documented live, sellable booth floor plan comparable to a trade-show map (checked September 2026). |
| Self-serve booth and sponsorship checkout | Exhibitors select and pay for space directly from the plan. | Stova's commerce-related pages emphasize registration and ticketing; we did not find a documented booth/sponsorship self-checkout flow on its own site (checked September 2026). |
| Exhibitor self-service portal | Profiles, staff badges, documents, add-ons, invoices and renewals. | Stova's Exhibitor Resource Center covers self-service portals and task tracking, per its own site (checked September 2026). |
| Registration, badging and lead retrieval | Available as quoted add-ons that connect to the same event record. | Documented: badge printing, check-in kiosks and Event Lead Capture for exhibitor badge scanning (checked September 2026). |
| Venue sourcing and hotel room-block management | Not offered. Map D links attendees to your existing hotel-booking or room-block page but does not source venues or negotiate room blocks itself — that stays a real limitation. | This is a genuine Stova strength: an eRFP tool, 225,000+ venue access and bid comparison, documented on Stova's own venue-sourcing page (checked September 2026). |
The alternatives worth shortlisting
Map D
Shows whose revenue comes from booth and sponsorship sales
Floor plan, booth sales, exhibitor management and reporting on one platform, priced per event and published, with registration and badging as quoted add-ons.
Cvent
Enterprise corporate meetings programs needing venue sourcing at scale
The largest platform in the broad-suite category; similarly quote-driven and broader than a floor-plan specialist.
MapYourShow
Large exhibition floor plans and public exhibitor directories
Closer in scope to Map D's floor-plan focus than to Stova's full meetings suite.
Whova
Attendee engagement and the conference mobile app
Strong attendee-side product for programs that want engagement tooling without the full enterprise suite.
Where Map D is stronger
- Pricing is flat and published: $1,500, $2,500 or $2,750 per event, with multi-year rates available. There's no per-registration fee that grows with attendance, unlike Stova's package-plus-per-registration model.
- The floor plan is the center of the product: live booth inventory, self-serve exhibitor checkout and exhibitor self-service all run off the same event record, purpose-built for shows that sell floor space rather than adapted from a broader meetings suite.
- Roughly 800 organizers run about 6,000 events a year on Map D, which has processed more than $250M in booth and sponsorship sales.
- A smaller, more focused surface area means less configuration and fewer modules to pay for and learn when your event's revenue is booths and sponsorships, not the full meetings lifecycle.
When Stova is the better choice
- You need integrated venue sourcing and hotel RFP/room-block negotiation as part of the same platform. This is a deliberate limitation for Map D — it links out to a hotel-booking page but does not source venues — and Stova's venue-sourcing module is real and well-documented.
- Your program spans many event formats — internal meetings, virtual/hybrid, large multi-track conferences — beyond trade-show floors, and you want one vendor across all of them rather than a floor-plan specialist plus other tools.
- You need deep attendee-engagement features (AI matchmaking, gamification, live polling) as first-class platform capabilities rather than a lighter add-on.
- You're already running on Meetingplay, Aventri or eventcore, and consolidating onto Stova's merged platform is less disruptive than switching to a different vendor entirely.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Stova cost?
Stova publishes starting prices for three packages on its own site: Core from $1,995, Pro from $5,995 and Enterprise from $12,995, each plus a starting per-registration fee of $3.00 to $5.60. The same page notes pricing may be adjusted based on event volume, contract length or requirements, so the listed number is a floor rather than a fixed rate. Map D's pricing is flat per event — $1,500, $2,500 or $2,750 — with no per-registration fee.
Is Stova the same as Meetingplay, Aventri or eventcore?
Yes. Meetingplay and Aventri merged and acquired eventcore, and the combined company launched as Stova in October 2022. If you're evaluating older reviews or contracts under those names, they now refer to Stova.
Does Stova have a trade-show floor plan and booth sales system?
Stova's platform documents a seating plan manager and room/resource inventory as part of its broader event-management suite, but we did not find a documented, live, sellable booth floor plan comparable to a dedicated trade-show platform. If booth and sponsorship sales are your event's revenue engine, that's a meaningful gap to check directly with Stova.
What is the best Stova alternative for a smaller trade show?
Map D — flat, published per-event pricing with no per-registration fee, and a floor plan built specifically for selling booth and sponsorship inventory rather than adapted from a broader meetings suite.
Stop reading about it. Build one.
Upload the floor plan you already have and place your booths on it yourself, in Map D’s editor. Free to build, no contract, and nothing to install.
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Related event solutions
Sources
- Stova packages/pricing · checked 2026-09-22
- Stova venue sourcing · checked 2026-09-22
- Stova event management platform capability page · checked 2026-09-22
- Stova rebrand announcement (Meetingplay, Aventri, eventcore to Stova) · checked 2026-09-22
- Map D pricing · checked 2026-09-22
