The thick and thin of IBTM
CATIE OWEN SPEAKS TO DAVID THOMPSON , EVENT DIRECTOR FOR IBTM WORLD , ABOUT THE HIGHS AND LOWS OF HOSTING IN 2021 AND THE LESSONS LEARNED ALONG THE WAY
A s one of the leading events for the meetings and events industry , you ’ d be hard pressed to find a global MICE organiser who hasn ’ t attended an IBTM World . During the height of the Covid-19 pandemic the show , like many events , had to make attendance an online-only experience . After two years of virtual networking and exhibiting , the in-person event that the industry knows and loves returned in 2021 . But , for many organisers , their own events have only just returned this year – or are still postponed until 2023 and beyond .
Reforming events for a post-pandemic world is no easy task – and no one knows that better than IBTM ’ s event director , David Thompson . David ’ s over 14 years of experience in the industry has seen him produce events for companies including the BBC , Clarion Events , and Haymarket Exhibitions .
With IBTM World ’ s second post-pandemic run right around the corner , David has shared how this year ’ s event has been influenced by both the heights and pitfalls of 2021 .
Catie Owen : 2021 ’ s IBTM World in Barcelona was the first held face-to-face after two years , what were the biggest challenges to organising and hosting the event post-pandemic ? David Thompson : The main focus was around safety . When you look at Maslow ’ s hierarchy of needs , the primary ones focus on food , water , and safety . What we were doing before Covid-19 was trying to give an emotional and memorable experience – navigating safety as an issue was not the same .
Following Covid-19 , making sure that people could walk into the environment feeling safe and comfortable was very important , and the key that allowed attendees to go on and have a memorable positive experience .
In terms of what they then saw at the 2021 event , there were a lot of safety precautions put in place when they arrived at the venue to make them feel like they were in a safety bubble . That was definitely a challenge .
The upside of that is that it made us really unearth every element of the event . We learned that our hosted buyers spent a lot of time queuing on their journey , all through the airport and into IBTM . Things like that contributed to an unsafe environment .
We felt we should completely change the game in terms of the experience that you ’ re able to give the buyers , so managed to reduce the event ’ s queue time from an average of 20 minutes to zero .
Another challenge , seen across the industry , was around the buyer . What we all saw back in 2020 was this mass exodus of the industry and a greater
“ Although virtual had allowed connections to come together , it wasn ’ t a longterm solution . The real value in hosting events is the face-toface experience .”
Left : David Thompson , event director , IBTM World
change of job roles . We had to invest more time and money into building our data and our buyer relationships .
From here , successfully brought about 1400 buyers into last year ’ s event . To be really honest , that ’ s not what we achieved in 2019 , but in 2021 ’ s environment it was a major of success to achieve .
Trying to run a major event in a landscape that keeps changing is very difficult . The challenge , when we isolated it , was down to travel confidence . That was obviously impacted by Covid-19 , especially when we never knew when the spikes were coming , or where they were coming from . Which , when you run a global event , was difficult to manage .
12 / CONFERENCE & MEETINGS WORLD / ISSUE 120