Music blasting from loudspeakers that pumped up the standing-room only crowd who cheered on the more than 20 contestants of the Bricklayer 500 World Championship, in which 800 bricks are placed in an hour flat, was just one of the many exciting opportunities offered to attendees of World of Concrete.

The show, which ran Feb. 2-5 at the Las Vegas Convention Center and is owned by Informa Exhibitions, was a huge hit overall, drawing its largest attendance in seven years, according to Tom Cindric, vice president at Informa.  

Private equity firm Sentinel Capital Partners bought Marketplace Events, which organizes home and garden shows in the United States and Canada. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

"We are very excited about our investment in Marketplace Events," said Michael Fabian, a partner at Sentinel. "We seek to invest in niche market leaders, and Marketplace Events is the clear leader in the North American home and garden show industry.”

The trade show industry had a strong kick off for 2016, with shows posting big exhibitor and attendee numbers that focused on not only what the newest gourmet food trends might be, but also the latest in musical instruments and everything that someone interested in shooting and hunting might need.

This year kicked off right with the LA Fit Expo, where nearly 60,000 expected attendees were on hand to share their love of fitness and health.  

The conference and exhibition was held Jan. 23-24 at the Los Angeles Convention Center. With so much going on at the show, it was hard to know where to go first.  And, with the two-day format, attendees packed the floor to get in as much as possible.

By Elizabeth Johnson

The cold January temperatures couldn’t be felt inside New York’s Jacob K. Javits Convention Center last week as the National Retail Federation’s (NRF) Big Show sizzled with new technology and solutions for retailers.

The show is held in New York City every year - the mecca of the retail industry and a convenient location for international retailers who make up about 25 percent of the attendees.

In the latest Center for Exhibition Industry Research’s 5-year Census Report, the number of annual business-to-business and business-to-consumer events in the United States increased 3.5 percent to 11,427.

The 2015 CEIR Exhibition Industry Census tracked the overall number of B-to-B and B-to-C shows held in the U.S., Canada and Mexico to be 13,447, accounting for just more than 107 million attendees and 1.9 million exhibitors.

The first-ever “Global Exhibitions Day” - a global initiative that unites exhibition organizers, venues, associations and service providers from countries all around the world - will launch June 8.

Driven by Paris-based UFI – The Global Association of the Exhibition Industry, and Dallas-based IAEE – The International Association of Exhibitions and Events, a growing list of associations and industry players have pledged to join forces to promote the industry and to highlight its achievements.

The status quo of holding a meeting the same old way just isn’t going to be good enough to truly capture and engage attendees in the future.

Change is on the horizon, with more of a focus on helping attendees find their ‘tribe’, create spaces and events for them to eat well and be well and make content more personalized and organic.

To address these imminent changes, Marriott International, as part of its Meetings Imagined initiative, partnered with the Professional Convention Management Association to review the implications on the future of meetings.

CES 2016 broke its own record from last year with 2.47 million net sq. ft. showfloor, up from 2.2 million last year, taking over the Las Vegas Convention Center, Sands Expo & Convention Center and the Venetian, as well as the Wynn, Aria, Vdara and Cosmopolitan.

Owned and produced by the Consumer Technology Association (formerly the Consumer Electronics Association), the world’s largest technology show took place Jan. 6–9.

For the first time, attendance was capped at 176,000 to help with logistics and actual attendance exceeded 170,000.

As part of his 2016 agenda, N.Y. Gov. Andrew Cuomo unveiled a $1 billion plan to dramatically increase not only the meeting and exhibit space at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center of New York, but also build a four-level marshaling yard and the largest ballroom in the Northeast.

“We are pleased to hear about the plan to expand the Javits Center on Manhattan’s Far West Side,” said Fred Dixon, president and CEO, NYC & Company.