EIBTM 2011 ended, having delivered three days of business opportunities and connections as the annual international event for the meetings industry broke all its own records.
Pre-show expectations were more than met with 64,950 Hosted Buyer pre-scheduled appointments leading the way to substantial business being conducted on the exhibition floor.
“Globally, this industry is responsible for 1.7 million jobs and $106 billion of GDP,” said Graeme Barnett, EIBTM event director. “Our role is to provide the platform and environment for the sector to meet and conduct business. Ultimately, we believe we have achieved that and more and delivered value and profitable results for our customers.”
As the show closes, early indications of just how successful this year’s event has been are recorded in the pre-audited figures. All tradeshow attendee numbers for Reed Travel Exhibitions (RTE) are subject to an independent ABC Audit to provide total transparency to all stakeholders.
Over 15,300 meetings industry professionals attended EIBTM over the three days including a total visitor and buyer attendance of 9,262 (last year’s pre-audited numbers were 8,395), 10.3 percent up on 2010, of which 3,904 were Hosted Buyers (last year’s pre-audited numbers were 3582) delivering a 9 percent increase on Hosted Buyer attendance from 2010.
With more than 100 professional education sessions – over 3,000 delegates attended seminars including those held in the Future Events Experience.
Eric Bakermans, meeting and conventions marketing manager of the Netherlands Board of Tourism & Conventions, summed up many exhibitor’s experiences of the business taking place on the show floor.
“We have been sold out solid, which means that EIBTM offers excellent business opportunities for the Dutch Business Events industry,” he said.
“We have always managed to close a lot of business at EIBTM, but this year it has been especially encouraging,” said Esteban Miso, congress and incentives department at Solways Group. “To start with, it is very well organized and on top of that we have more than 80 percent of the appointments and had more contacts than last year. We have also closed group bookings of approximately 2000 persons in various groups for 2012.”
EIBTM 2012 will take place from November 27 – 29.
