Exhibitor numbers significantly up

This year some 3 000 visitors came to the three-day DIY & Homing trade fair in Kortrijk, Belgium, in search of information about new ideas and products. The first day of the event, Sunday 25 September, turned out to be relatively poor (-16 per cent), apparently because the weather was so good. The total number of 165 exhibiting companies was 20 per cent above last year’s level. However, the visitor registration figures for this 30th staging of the fair remained overall below expectations.The organisers had incorporated invitations to two working breakfasts with seminars on the garden market into the supporting programme. The speaker on the Monday of the fair was Bruno Lanthier, managing director of Truffaut, market leader in the French garden centre segment. He dealt with the European market and the question of what the plant centres of the future will look like if they want to appeal to customers of both sexes.The second talk was given by Marco Orlandelli, an Italian supplier of garden centre fittings and industry consultant. Among the subjects he addressed was the question of the formats that garden centres, both independent and chain operations, will in the future adopt in the Benelux states. After this year the fair is to be held only once every two years. The organisers have not so far decided whether they will stick to the autumn date in 2013 or look for a new date in the spring.