m+a report: According to the latest UFI Global Exhibition Barometer, the most pressing short-term business issues for the exhibition industry are “State of the economy in home market”, “Geopolitical challenges” and “Global economic developments”. Given your previous work as Global Managing Director in risk and business analysis – which has certainly shaped your view of the markets – what specific risks and opportunities do you currently see for the industry, and how should organisers prepare for them?
 

Hugh Jones: Post covid, exhibitions at the top of any category should be able to thrive, however, smaller shows will struggle to find increasing visitor numbers. Businesses have cut back on their willingness to send visitors as they have decreased their post-covid budgets. Therefore, we as an industry must work much harder on visitor catchment, not simply exhibitor sales. The way to do that will be to prioritize the visitor segments we want at our exhibitions and deploy specific marketing strategies that capture the share of mind of people within that segment. It’s no longer a “build it and the visitors will come” world.