15 October 1998: The positive signs of an improvement in the climate of consumption in evidence during the run-up to Tendence International Frankfurt Fair were confirmed during the course of the five-…
15 October 1998: The positive signs of an improvement in the climate of consumption in evidence during the run-up to Tendence International Frankfurt Fair were confirmed during the course of the five-day fair. 50 years after the first post war fair in Frankfurt am Main, the world“s biggest consumer-goods fair in the autumn closed its doors on 2 September, after registering a slight increase in the number of visitors. With almost 103,000 trade visitors from over 140 countries, Tendence “98 surpassed both the results of last year“s fair (100,000) and the expectations of Messe Frankfurt. Almost one in five of all visitors came from outside Germany. “The mood in the trade is very good and buyers ordered accordingly. They purchased complete themes and merchandising concepts. No longer are they prepared to think about individual products. Instead, they purchase new products together with sales and marketing measures, which are, of course, much in demand,” said Bernd Horenkamp, sales director of Glaskoch (Leonardo), whose opinion, said the fair organizers, is representative of many of the approximately 5,000 exhibitors from 87 countries. Messe Frankfurt“s proposal that the major international fairs should also be opened to the general public for part of the time in the future, gave trade visitors and exhibitors food for thought and discussion. A large percentage of the exhibitors at the Ambiente and Tendence consumer-goods fairs would welcome the chance to present their new collections to consumers. This would stimulate demand for new products and attract more customers to the trade, the organizers said. In conjunction with its partners on the exhibitor and visitor sides, Messe Frankfurt said it will prepare a concept for opening up the consumer goods fair to the general public along the lines of the steps already taken at the Frankfurt Music Fair and the ISH. The majority of the approximately 20,000 foreign visitors came from neighbouring European countries; the highest rates of growth were registered in the number of visitors from Italy, Great Britain, Northern Ireland, Poland and the Czech Republic. The bulk of overseas visitors came from the US, Japan, Taiwan, China, Hong Kong, India, Brazil, Israel, Canada and South Korea. Despite the economic crisis in the Far East, there was also an increase in the number of Asian buyers at Tendence.