NEXT DRUPA CUT FROM 11 DAYS TO 9

The next drupa will run for nine days, down from the 11 it took for this year’s show, with the event scheduled from 9-17 May 2028, as the world’s biggest print trade show slims down in a new era.

The organiser says the reduction in days is in response to the higher proportion of CEOs, owners and top managers attending the show, some three quarters of all visitors, who, it says, tend to spend less time there.

Wolfram Diener, chairman and CEO of Messe Düsseldorf, said, “At this year’s drupa, 76 per cent of visitors were part of top and middle management. As a B2B trade fair with a very high proportion of decision-makers from all over the world, the length of stays at drupa has become shorter.”

Diener said a shorter duration for higher management was in line with the other big industrial shows at Messe Dusseldorf, including interpack and K, that he said, “address comparable customer profiles, and do very well with a similar duration.”

“We comprehensively and carefully analysed the recommendations of our drupa committee, the results of exhibitor and visitor surveys and feedback from partners and associations”, said Sabine Geldermann, director of drupa. “Shortening the fair’s duration is a direct response to the industry’s desire for a more focused, efficient event that continues to provide international participants with an opportunity to discover groundbreaking innovations and technology.”

The conceptual direction, new key visual and future claim of drupa 2028 will be presented to the industry next year.

The 11-day 2024 show attracted some 175,000 visitors, from 173 countries, down by 90,000 from the 15-day 2016 event, and was the lowest number in the expo's history, which began in 1951. The the new millennium 2000 show saw 428,000 printers come to Dusseldorf, while the peak was a decade earlier with a mammoth 444,000 print professionals descending on drupa in 1990.

Drupa remains by far the world’s biggest print trade show, its numbers dwarfing Igas in Tokyo and Printing United in the US by six times. The Chinese shows attract the most visitors after drupa, with the last All in Print China seeing 108,000 visitors from 126 countries go through the doors in Shanghai.