‘Clearly AVEX can no longer continue to fund the running of the trade association' - Charles Trace

Published: 18 June, 2008

When I took over as Chairman of the AVA in 2006, the AVEX show for 2007 was already booked to return to Earls Court, but in a different format to previous shows. In order to keep overall costs to a minimum, the show was to include a section devoted to the water cooler industry plus a series of workshops and a conference with well-known people from the industry talking on several topics. The organisers tried hard to persuade exhibitors away from building large, lavish stands in favour of smaller affairs and to keep exhibitor costs down.

From my point of view, I thought AVEX 2007 was a thoroughly professional and well run show, setting out to showcase all that is excellent about our industry. All stand space was sold out some weeks before the event and visitor numbers remained around the same as in 2005. This bucked the trend of recent trade shows who had reported a steep decline in their visitor and exhibitor numbers. I felt the quality of visitors and in particular real decision makers who attended the ‘07 show was significantly better than in ‘05. Speaking as an exhibitor we reported a very good show.

All that said, I had realised that for 2009 the AVA needed to completely rethink the show, the venue and the number of days open to the public. During our tour around the country it was evident that the membership wanted change and therefore the AVEX committee and the incoming Chairman Barry Bennett took the decision to move back to Birmingham, reduce the show to two days and to move it slightly later in the year to June. I feel the time is now right for change and hope that we can return to the style and success of the 1999 show staged at the NEC in Birmingham. There will be a number of completely new initiatives for visitor and exhibitor alike and in terms of transport links, Birmingham is now a real central hub with excellent road, rail and air links to the city.

I have been attending AVEX since 1977 and have always come away from a show feeling extreme pride in belonging to an exceptional industry. As an exhibitor you have to work hard to get your leads and to keep coming up with proactive ways of attracting people to your stand - success then follows. I am still a great believer in keeping AVEX as our industry showcase - rather than resorting to smaller regional shows around the UK. Clearly AVEX can no longer continue to fund the running of the trade association but it most certainly is a very important aspect of the industry where every other year businesses make sure that it is used to promote and launch a wide range of new products and initiatives.

Printer friendly version

Email this article to a friend

Bookmark this