Seybold and the drupa Countdown

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For the past two years, each of the trade events known to us has witnessed tumbling visitor numbers. With the exception of last year’s LabelExpo and GraphExpo in Chicago, which managed to keep attendance stable, all regional graphic fairs have been struggling with dwindling turnover figures. Machine manufacturers like Heidelberg, MAN Roland, KBA, Mitsubishi and Muller Martini reproach fair organisers for a general lack of focus and innovation, and prefer to organise Open House events at their plants and distribution centres rather than disperse their resources at too many local trade fairs. A leaden economy is down-sizing national fairs and shifting audiences. In England, Print UK 2003 was cancelled altogether. And yet, like a magician’s stick, it’s a trade fair that is assumed will draw us all out of the slump — drupa 2004. So maybe we just have to exercise a little more patience . . .

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