Future drupa – Patrick Howard looks at the outlook for trade shows

As the last visitors make their way from the massive Messe Düsseldorf grounds it’s time to take a look at the viability of future drupas and ask whether there is any point in having trade shows in an internet age.

At the halfway point of this year’s 14-day drupa, organisers reported 213,000 visitors from 115 countries had passed through the turnstiles – 64 percent of them from outside Germany. While not a record it was quite an achievement and put the show on track for a satisfactory final total.

Up to yesterday 1,971 exhibitors from 52 countries had spruiked and demonstrated their wares for the printing industry throughout the 19 huge exhibition halls. High technology printing machinery, offset and digital presses, electronic networks, paper and inks, prepress and postpress and the multitude of other tools of trade were on display at exhibition booths large and small.

For those who made the trip it was a glorious cornucopia of printing technology, seasoned with plenty of partying and networking in the pleasant city dubbed ‘Paris on the Rhine.’ For those who didn’t go it’s a bit like hearing about the great party you missed; bearable the first time but after that a growing irritation.

And does it matter whether you attended or not? As an industry professional will you still be able to access the information on the latest releases, the new press models, and the technology trends even if you never left home? Of course you will. The internet has become the new dimension, not only of information but also of communication and it poses the question as to the viability of trade shows in the future.

There was a time when trade shows were used to unveil surprises, to steal a march on rivals with the launch of a new hitherto unsuspected technology. That is no longer the case. Among the many product launches at this year’s drupa there was scarcely one that had not been trumpeted in the media and across the internet for weeks and months prior to the show.

Bernard Schreier, ceo of Heidelberg set the tone earlier in the year with his remarks that surprises are not appropriate in today’s capital intensive industry. Investment decisions are not lightly undertaken and are not likely to be influenced by wild cards introduced at a trade show.

The cost of product development and the importance of time to market have become so crucial that products are no longer held back for launch at drupa or any other trade show. Manufacturers do not rely on one-off events to maintain their product lines or their relationships with customers.

So what’s the point of drupa and trade shows in general? Do they have a future?
Attendances at trade shows, at least in the graphic arts, have been steadily falling for years. If it were not for the international contingent at drupa – the many Indian, Chinese and South American visitors– the local German participation, now down to 36 percent, would scarcely sustain the show. Drupa organisers are trying to encourage the locals with a range of seminars and conferences. Other show organisers are doing the same.

The delivery of information is playing a more central role with application solutions more eagerly sought after than machinery inspections. Many of the products on show at drupa, especially the inkjet engines, are still a way off from commercialisation. For these new technologies you can look but you cannot buy.
But what you can do is compare like with like, result with result. And this is where the true value of trade shows lies. When you know what you are trying to achieve a visit to a trade show, a drupa or our own PacPrint, allows you to compare all the different products that might meet your requirements. You can walk from stand to stand, talk to different sales people, examine the output or even perhaps clock the changeover times.

For all those who distrust specifications, who rely on their own judgement when investing considerable sums, there is nothing like a trade show for finding out the true relativities. Even in established products such as offset presses you can measure performance and output to your own satisfaction, witness the actual changeover times, then walk to the next hall and see what the opposition is doing.

So, yes, drupa was a great party, a wonderful show, but those visitors who had a specific mission to compare competing solutions or different product lines are the real winners. This type of information you cannot access over the internet. All it requires is an open mind and a determination to only buy after examining the entire range of solutions.

So I’ll be seeing you at drupa in four years time, if not at PacPrint in Melbourne next year.