COP25
A vision of the future in COP25’s Green Zone?
WILLIAM THOMSON, MD GALLUS EVENTS, REPORTS FROM THE GREEN ZONE EXHIBITION AREA
AT THE RECENT WORLD CLIMATE CHANGE CONFERENCE COP25 IN MADRID
reen in colour and in
mindset, the UN attempted
to run a sustainable
tradeshow at the hastily
re-arranged Madrid COP25 UN Climate
Change Conference last December.
Attending the exhibition area at one of
the most important global conferences
this year should fill you with excitement.
However, it is in fact a bit underwhelming.
Strip away the beautiful stands you
normally see at important events – those
ones built to impress and attract visitors
– and any exhibition would look a little
bare. However, this is the future.
Stripped back exhibitions will have to
be part of the events industry’s plan to
become more sustainable.
This is why the COP conference’s
exhibition, at the most important climate
event in the world this year, was
important for the industry.
The climate crisis and the increasing
pressure to become more sustainable, has
forced the industry to ask if we can have
meaningful exhibitions without the bells,
whistles, shell scheme and set-piece
builds?
In trying to answer that question, this
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CONFERENCE & MEETINGS WORLD
Above: Action
stations at IFEMA
in Madrid
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ISSUE 104
part of COP25 showcases not only the
exhibitors, but the very idea of a
sustainable exhibition.
Taking on that challenge with only five
weeks’ notice (this event was originally
scheduled to take place in Santiago, but
moved because of disorder in the Chilean
capital) was bound to pose increased
complexities for the organisers at IFEMA
Madrid.
For those understandable reasons the
show floor was pretty empty. A 15-minute
walk covered the whole site.
Spanish power giants Iberdrola and
Endesa slipped in to fill the space vacated
by the original exhibitors from Chile and,
although many other exhibitors
evaporated, the sustainable ethos has
remained.
On entering the exhibition in Madrid
delegates were immediately struck by the
openness of the hall: great for the casual
visitor, but it felt like emptiness to the
experienced exhibition-goer.
Instead of that slightly claustrophobic
but comforting feeling you get when you
enter a tradeshow, this one encouraged
you to breathe in and experience the
feeling of a pared back show floor.
At the centre of the hall was a round
theatre, built for an audience of around
300. It made a great central point for the
show floor. Speakers bounded on and off
throughout the day.
The shell scheme stands were wooden
and come with large plasma screens for
branding and display. Paper and plastics
were out and there were no visitor badges.
Look across the space and you
struggled to find anything that wasn’t
either totally reusable or recycled.
Furniture, signage and stage sets all
made of reinforced cardboard, grabbed
the attention as delegates moved
throughout the hall.
There were interactive and educational
areas spaced among the dozen or so
stands, and it is clear that this Green Zone
had more of an educational focus than a
traditional exhibition.
However, it was a tradeshow in all of its
central aspects and it might just be the
template for all our exhibitions in the
years to come.
Adopting this innovative, stripped back
approach to a tradeshow would see
organisers and exhibitors spending
considerably less on materials.
It would see shorter venue hires: this
whole site will be cleared in a couple of
hours, and in smaller halls.
Crucially, and perhaps most
importantly, it would see the exhibition
industry take huge steps towards
removing the pile of waste that
accompanies many of our shows.
Sustainability is perhaps the greatest
drive for innovation in the exhibition
industry, and we have a lot of innovation
ahead of us.
William Thomson is MD of Gallus Events
and on social media @williamevents