Do What’s Best for Each Exhibitor

MOSCOW - <> published an article by Vladislav
Malkevich, Director General of Expocentre (Moscow). The theme of the article:
the impact of the world financial crisis in its broad economic context on
exhibition activities in Russia.

“The situation as it is emerging to-day has already had
negative effect on the Economy as a whole. The exhibition sector is no
exception,” says Mr. Malkevich. “Many major operators are beginning to feel
the crunch: exhibitors not as willing to exhibit making their exhibition
budgets a source of savings as part of general policy of reducing promotion
activities for their goods and services. Still, business must be
profit-oriented and that makes participation in most representative trade
shows a must, crisis or no crisis.”

“Exhibitions are a built-in feature of any market,” says
Malkevich in his article. “For a big company to abandon a major national
trade show is synonymous with abandoning the market place all-together. It
contradicts the spirit and the aims of every business which are to stay on in
the market and develop its presence with goods and services. And exhibitions
help to do just that.”

Expocentre’s achievements in 2008 point to high interest of
the Business in exhibitions. 36 Expocentre’s own and 72 “guest” shows were
held on Expocentre’s premises during the year. The number of visitors was
more than a million. Most visitors were industry experts. 105 countries were
involved in Expocentre’s Exhibition Program.

Most of the shows across the range have grown. For instance:
Metalloobrabotka-2008 was 23% bigger than the previous one. Elektro - 13%
bigger. Neftegaz and Lesdrevmash - one third bigger. The salon of ophthalmic
optics (MSOO) showed growth of 86%. Mir Detstva exhibition was bigger 20%.
“Sklad. Transport. Logistics” - 36% bigger. All those shows have long been
awarded “approved event” signs from UFI - The Global Association of
Exhibition Industry and the Russian Union of Exhibitions and Fairs (RUEF).
They are all held under the auspices of the “RF Chamber of Commerce and
Industry.”

Improving quality of services in arranging exhibitions is
particularly important in a critical situation. That is a strong view of V.
Malkevich, Director General of Expocentre :”Exhibition services help
exhibitors achieve what they want through exhibiting. Success is expressed in
the number of contracts and leads they get.”

Source: Expocentre

Arkadiy V. Didevich, Head of Press Centre, didevich at expocentr.ru, +7-499-256-74-50