Welcoming delegates back to town for the first time in three years the host venue of IMEX in Frankfurt, Messe Frankfurt, was keen to emphasize that the destination is quickly re-establishing its pre-pandemic position. This May alone it received 110,000 event participants, with a further 140 events scheduled for the latter half of 2022, edging it close to levels last seen in 2019.
Stealing a march on the much-longed-for return to the newish normal was London, who today announced that the major expansion of the city’s ExCel International Convention Center was well under way and will boost the venue with an additional 25,000 square meters of event space. Offering state-of-the-art convention facilities, exhibition halls and conference rooms, and set to exceed sustainability standards when it all comes on stream, the facility will be further enhanced by a dedicated station of the latest line in the city’s transport network that opened just last week, the Elizabeth Line. This will connect the venue to central London in just 12 minutes and slash journey times to Heathrow Airport. Market confidence has also returned, with delegate numbers at events held there up 20% from expected and international delegates making up to 80% of these totals. Notching up a haul of 350 events this year, London’s Deputy Mayor for Business, Rajesh Agrawal, was eager to stress that “after two years of insecurity, it’s very clear the events industry in London is roaring back to life.”
Also coming to life across the show floor was the fruit of new brand campaigns hatched during the hiatus years. Business Events Australia, a destination long in limbo, has just rolled out the second phase of its campaign. It’s scheduled to run through June with a suite of new brand films that are part of a broader recovery strategy and target incentive and association customers in the U.K., Europe, North America, South-South East Asia and New Zealand.
“We are committed to supporting industry in rebuilding the pipeline business for Australia and, as a result, are ramping up our business events marketing and distribution activity to ensure the world knows Australia is open for business,” said Robin Mack, Tourism Australia’s executive general manager of Commercial and Business Events Australia.
Making a similar pledge from the same side of the world was Thailand, showcasing their new brand campaign of “Meet the Magic” to coincide with the country re-opening to delegates as well as travelers from June 1. Formulated to tap into the country’s new goals of revitalizing the traveler’s experience and re-energizing the industry after two dormant years, Thailand is hungry to reclaim its erstwhile event destination allure and will kick off again later in June when it welcomes—and, of course, adds magic to—the 2022 Global Summit of Women to be held in Bangkok.
Brand campaign with particular oomph was reserved for the Kingdom of Bahrain, who had two main announcements to make at today’s show signaling their intent to get in on the thriving business event sector of the Middle East. First of all, the Bahrain International Exhibition and Convention Centre is to be rebranded the Exhibition World Bahrain. Secondly, and more importantly, it will be a brand-new facility to come on stream in the final quarter of 2022, making it the newest exhibition and convention center in the GCC region. It promises to be an architecturally stunning new facility, not to mention a capacious one: 95,000 square meters of total exhibition space, including 95 meeting rooms, a Grand Hall for 4,000 and 10 exhibition halls. Moreover, the venue will adjoin the existing Sport City in Bahrain, home of the GP racing event, and seek to nurture economic synergies across the sectors. They would also like to have an expanded use of the venue, such as for concerts, to break away from the typical convention center formula.
In formula breaking mode, one of the final releases of the day was by Transcend Cruises, who unveiled their innovative and breathtaking river cruising venues. The concept has emerged from a group of hospitality vanguards and their vessels offer space configuration, accommodation flexibility, full branding, state-of-the-art public spaces, dedicated wellness and fitness zones and a complete support framework to solve the challenges of meeting, incentive corporate group and event buyers.
“We are thrilled to be at IMEX Frankfurt to unveil details on our ships which are created expressly for the group market,” said Matthew Shollar, CEO and co-founder of Transcend Cruises. “We are partnering with meeting and incentive planners to deliver a tailored product that puts the planner and their client first and offers opportunities for the MICE market that have until now never been offered on the rivers of Europe.”
Set to take sail in spring 2024 and with significant advance interest, these 135-meter floating meeting venues will first be seen on the Rhine, Danube and the Moselle, with further European waterways already on the radar.
Whilst Transcend was offering some calm cruising to the world of events, it wasn’t all plain sailing at the return to IMEX, with much chatter revolving around the current travel turmoil for many to attend the event and the global HR issues being experienced across the industry. Alongside more breaking news from the global event industry, the coming days may hold some solutions to these post-pandemic legacies, which is a timely reminder as to why we meet and will always need to do so.
