New member, more transparency in another new country, new collaboration projects
With admittance of Expo Arad International from Romania as a new member of Centrex Union, credible, comparable exhibition statistics now is spreading in 6 countries of Central East Europe.
CENTREX International Exhibition Statistics Union - based in Budapest - held her latest Board meeting in Brno, Czech Republic on February 23, 2004. Trade Fairs Brno was the venue as well as co-operating partner of the simultaneous organisation of 2nd CEEEF - workshop on Fair Education - that took place on February 22-23, 2004.
The main results of the February meeting - over the yearly customary corporate activity - financial report / acceptance and of activity and budget proposal for 2004 of the Union - were the
- admittance of a new Centrex member Expo Arad International,
- re-election of Mr. Boguslaw Zalewski as Chairman of the Board of Directors and Mr. Jiri Knop as Executive Director for another 2 years,
- an interim report on the ongoing Central East European visitor survey and
- fast sum up of 2nd CEEEF finished that afternoon.
With admittance of Expo Arad International (Romania) credible, comparable exhibition statistics - according to the strict Centrex rules - are now already available in 6 countries in Central and East Europe. Expo Arad International has been organising exhibitions since 10 years. Two years ago the company has built her own exhibition centre not far from the Hungarian border. The first 2000 square metres hall could be established by winning CBC funds from the EU. Building of additional pavilions is planned in the near future. The points of strength of the company include high professionalism, open-minded approach and through Centrex membership now the credibility of exhibition statistics - as first company in Romania of this kind.
The other important point of the Board Meeting was the preliminary report, assessment of the state of the joint Central East European visitor survey launched at the third decade of previous year. To remind: the idea of Central East European visitor survey - the first of its kind in the region as one of our new projects - was born less than a year now. The period devoted to this survey ranged from August 2003 till February 2004, it covers over 20 fairs and exhibitions of the 'CENTREX countries'. The final results are expected to be published in second half of 2004.
Launching of the survey is highly important for Centrex members because according to the latest results of other surveys in the world exhibitions face tremendously changing demands and the occurrence and behaviour of visitors gain increasing importance. Visitors being the common target group of both exhibitors and organisers so it is imperative to study the occurrence and demands of the visitors to rightly adjust our activity to their requirements.
The first feedback of just completed 2nd CEEEF (Central East European Exhibition Forum)was really appreciative. The main topics - fair education at universities, business colleges, educating exhibitors and visitors to arrive at best profit from using exhibitions, as a marketing tool. CENTREX in line with this ambition all over the exhibition industry took the initiative to examine the current situation in the region, to draw conclusions and plans for the future. The workshop was staged with the participation of lecturers, leading professors of marketing at economic universities, fair organisers and marketing experts - from 11 countries.
(For more information on the workshop please visit www.ceeef.org.)
CENTREX members are devoted to strengthen collaboration in further aspects of exhibition industry so the preparations of the 3rd CEEEF shall be launched shortly - topic is to be decided at the next board meeting.
As sign of full appreciation and success of the past years both Mr. Boguslaw Zalewski (President of Poznan International Fair) and Mr. Jiri Knop (director of Trade Fairs Brno) have been respectively re-elected as CENTREX Chairman and Executive Director for another 2 years term.