When Markus Geisenberger and Martin Buhl-Wagner talk about 2021, there is a lot of talk about confidence. You are the managing director of Leipziger Messe and after the disastrous Corona year 2020 you want to go back to conventional trade fairs with personal meetings. “We humans are social beings. We want to experience ourselves personally in order to develop sympathy and gain trust. This is the only way to create cooperation,” says Buhl-Wagner. He is convinced: “The pandemic clearly shows the indispensability of face-to-face fairs and congresses.”

Public fairs from April? In the first three months of the new year nobody in the industry is expecting public events. It should not start again until the second quarter. In the Leipzig trade fair calendar, the big book fair, which they moved from their traditional date in March to May, stands out. In any case, that is the signal, there should be the book show this year – after it 2020 was one of the first major trade fairs that was canceled due to Corona

More than 80 further canceled trade fairs followed nationwide, plus countless congresses and major events.

High business losses “The corona pandemic has hit the German trade fair industry 2020 hit to an almost unimaginable extent, “says Jörn Holtmeier, managing director of the AUMA industry association. “International and regional trade fairs planned over 360 were over 70 Percent canceled or postponed to the next year. ” Under normal circumstances, the industry generates a turnover of four billion euros. 2020, according to Holtmeier, only about a quarter of this was achieved. The new year should get better, even if the pre-crisis level of 360 will remain unattainable.

The large trade fair companies, including Messe Frankfurt, are publicly owned – they can rely on financial support from their owners, i.e. federal states or municipalities. But what about all the jobs that depend on the trade fair business – the stand builders, the hotel and catering industry, the taxi drivers and freight forwarders? AUMA boss Holtmeier calculates that the organization of trade fairs in normal years 28 contributes billions of euros to economic output. Of these 2020 only around 6 billion remained.

“The bottom line was that the year was devastating. That is completely undisputed”, says Jan Kalbfleisch, managing director of the trade association for trade fair and exhibition construction (Famab). The feared large wave of bankruptcies among the 80 mostly medium-sized exhibition construction companies has not yet materialized. “But that is solely because the obligation to file for bankruptcy is suspended,” says Kalbfleisch. For many companies, a look at the books on the balance sheet date will be 31. December bring a rude awakening.

Inadequate Corona aid Veal is also dissatisfied with the Corona aid the federal government. They changed too often, and the November aid, for example, was so complicated and with exceptions, that the companies hardly received anything. “We always say: You can almost be happy that you don’t have to pay anything there.” The head of the association calls for firm, fixed-cost-based help for the company, “instead of monthly changing programs, of which one does not know what is left at the end”. 2021 Veal does not expect business to pick up until the second half of the year.

Especially on the Detlef Knaack, head of the fair caterer Fairgourmet in Leipzig, is also setting the second half of the year. With 80 employees, he usually takes care of the catering of congresses and events. Since April 2020 his kitchen and service staff have been on short-time work. “We’ll definitely lose January, February and March. You can’t catch up with that either. The cup of coffee won’t be drunk again.” The situation is no different with the competitors. “We don’t share much else. But at the moment we all share the same suffering.”

After the abrupt Corona stop for the trade fairs last spring, many organizers tried to save their formats to digital or to organize a hybrid trade fair later, such as the IFA. Depending on the topic, that worked sometimes more and sometimes less well. According to the trade fair association AUMA, 40 percent of the companies from large capital goods industries that otherwise exhibit at trade fairs suffer economic losses because of their traditional Platforms for business initiation and conclusion were missing. Despite all the optimism: The way back to normal for the trade fair industry remains long. Leipzig’s trade fair boss Martin Buhl-Wagner says he would be happy 2021 half of the sales for the pre-crisis year 2019.

(olb)