Veteran business reporter Marilyn Nason passed away on February 12, just one month short of her 92nd birthday, following a brief battle with cancer. The only child of parents who founded a Manhattan-based publishing and trade show business which operated nine magazines in the gift and home décor industry, she liked to joke that she had been covering trade shows since before she was born. Nason happily covered the gift, toy, home décor, flooring, and lighting markets for nearly 80 years and her work has been published in industry trade magazines such as Home Lighting & Accessories and enLIGHTenment Magazine, among others. In fact, Nason had attended LIGHTOVATION, the Dallas Total Home & Gift Market, and the Atlanta Market this past January before succumbing to illness.
Bob Maricich, CEO of International Market Centers (IMC), said, “Marilyn was an intrepid member of our industry press corps and always had a finger – or two – firmly on the market’s pulse. She was well-known and highly regarded within our industry and she will be missed by all who knew her.”
Nason moved from Asheville, N.C. to Winter Haven, Fla. in 2015. She is survived by her son, Steve, a business reporter who worked alongside Marilyn, covering trade shows. Her husband, Slim, and eldest son, Al, predeceased her.
In her free time, Nason was an active community volunteer, personally knitting some 500 soft-yarn “cat pads” for animals caged at Polk County Animal Control – a tradition of her mother’s which she carried forward. The pads were donated to shelters and given to cats and kittens as a comfortable cushion that would be familiar bedding that could go with the cats to their new home following adoption.
