Feature
10 years of CHS
The organiser of the Conference & Hospitality Show looks
back on a decade serving the North’s event community
“W
hen you’ve got a really good
model, you don’t want to
change anything just because it’s the
10th year,” reflects Emma Cartmell,
CEO of CHS Group, organiser of the
Conference & Hospitality Show (CHS).
“People still have expectations of what
they’re going to get from a business
perspective, and the buyers do as well.”
EN is meeting with Cartmell to
discuss the 10th birthday of CHS, a
one-day event connecting organisers
with venues and suppliers held annually
in Leeds.
“Ten years has flown by,” she
continues. “It doesn’t feel like it at all.
I’ve got that self-pressurised idea of
‘what do we do now?’. If it isn’t broke
don’t fix it, but also you don’t want it
getting stale.”
CHS has evolved from humble
beginnings into a relatively large show
(around 250 exhibitors in the city’s
First Direct Arena), but an area of pride
for Cartmell is the fact that
the organising team have
managed to stay true to the
promises they made when the
show first launched in 2010.
“Things like never
negotiating on price,
never letting there be
entertainment in the day while people
are doing business and not allowing
students into the show,” she tells EN.
“Those things still hold true and I’m
really proud that they do.
“I don’t think things have
dramatically changed in the last
ten years. For us it’s still all about
relationships. We have people attending
and exhibiting at the show who’ve been
at every event.
“Everything has become more
sophisticated, but the ethos is the
same. I still know buyers or exhibitors
personally when they come through the
door. As a business our values are still
the same and what we do is the same.”
With the show now wall-bound in
Leeds’ largest exhibition venue it sold
out well become Christmas, despite not
taking place until April, which Cartmell
sees as a blessing and a curse.
“I’m a big believer that it should
only grow due to visitor numbers not
because you could sell more.
The growth has to be driven
by visitor numbers. We sold
out and it’s a nice position to
be in, but from an exhibition
organiser perspective it’s
hard because you’re leaving
money on the table. We have
to think now about how else people can
get involved if they can’t be there and
we’ve reduced the seminar space – it’s
still same number of seats but we’ve
sweated the area a bit more.”
The audience for the show, in terms
of visitors, is relatively localised, with
approximately 25 per cent coming
from Leeds, 25 per cent from Yorkshire
outside of Leeds and 50 per cent outside
of Yorkshire but still largely hailing
from the Midlands and the North.
EN asks if Cartmell would consider
expanding the show to be a two-day
event.
“I would only make it two days if
the venue told me I had to because of
demand,” she says. “Buyers say they
haven’t got enough time to get around,
but equally I know most of them
wouldn’t come for two days.
“Exhibitors also like the fact that
it’s one day. We work with a lot of
independently-owned venues who don’t
have big budgets, we’re very accessible
in terms of price and in terms of what
we do. A one-day show means they can
get out of the office.”
When we ask what the future holds
for the show, Cartmell reveals that she’s
just finished writing the business plan
for the next three years.
“I get excited about possibilities,” she
concludes. “Ten years ago, I was doing
a small event with 30 or 40 venues and
around 200 people through the door. I
never imagined we’d end up where we
are now.” EN
April — 33