Stone+tec 2007 Stays Solid
NUREMBERG, Germany – With the construction economy of central Europe holding its own – and showing signs of improvement – it’s not surprising that Stone+tec 2007 reflected that optimistic outlook.
The 41,084 trade visitors at the biennial natural-stone expo on June 6-9 represented a 1.9-percent increase in attendance from the 2005 exhibition – something that cheered the event’s organizers.
“That the natural stone industry is recovering again has been apparent since last year,” says Roland Kast, exhibition director of Stone+tec at NürnbergMesse, the exhibition center that hosts the event. “The market remains a hard-fought market, however, and the result of this process was still clearly noticeable on the part of the exhibitors. This makes us all the more pleased about the great influx of visitors on the four days of the exhibition.”
The attendance figures for the 15th edition of Stone+tec likely benefited from several events – most notably the weather. While nearly every German TV network, newspaper and weather Website predicted stormy, rainy weather that might hamper attendees, skies remained sunny and offered a pleasant late spring climate.
Stone+tec also benefited again from the regional Bavarian holiday of the Feast of The Ascen on June 7; with most businesses closed, attendance shot up dramatically. (The trade event is scheduled to incorporate the holiday, which explains its movement around the calendar every two years.)
What also became apparent during the event was the drop in vendors; the 963 exhibitors for this year’s event marked an 8.9-percent decline from 2005. Several halls, including those for stone machinery, weren’t as full of stands as in previous years, although all exhibit areas included a good cross-section of international companies.
In fact, the international (non-German) share of exhibitors for 2007 was 66 percent; foreign visitors made up 28 percent of the attendee mix. The leading exhibiting nations after Germany were Italy, China, Turkey and Spain; attendees came from Europe, India, North America, China, Israel and the United Arab Emirates.
Stone+tec also showed some strong brand loyalty, according to an attendee survey. More than two thirds of this year’s visitors have already decided to visit Stone+tec in Nuremberg again in 2009, and half of them visit Stone+tec as their only natural-stone exhibition,
A survey shows that both visitors and exhibitors at Stone+tec 2007 are looking to the future with confidence: Around one-quarter of both groups assume that the economic situation in the industry will remain steady at the present level and over half the visitors and as many as two thirds of the exhibitors expect their economies to be on the rise.
The next Stone+tec takes place at Exhibition Centre Nuremberg on May 20-23, 2009. For more information, go to www.stone-tec.com.