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Exhibition News Magazine
Complicated?
It’s what
we do
Setting aside for a moment the economic impact, number
of mothballed jobs and the fact that major venues have
served as Nightingale Hospitals, I do still find it odd that
exhibitions will pretty much be the last form of organised
gatherings to get the government green-light to restart.
Exhibitions and football crowds.
Currently, football supporters will be capped at 30% of
a ground’s capacity from 1 October, regardless of stadium
design, transport links and infection rates. The Premier
League is challenging this, insisting that the technology
to allow for the introduction of fan clinical passports is
available and it shouldn’t be penalised just because other
sports can’t implement it.
Exhibitions on the other hand, already have a tried
and tested track-and-trace mechanic in place - it’s called
registration. On page 26, Andrew Evans, MD of Thorough
Events confesses that his determination for going ahead
with London Concours was born of frustration that public
markets were allowed to function with no control over who
attends and which stands people visit, whilst exhibitions
with all their tracking technology were not.
The commonality between the return of football fans and
exhibitions restarting is that they both fall within the remit
of the DCMS - a government department that apparently
opposes fan clinical passports on the basis it could ‘prove
too complicated’.
Complicated is pivoting from a live show environment
to a virtual event one at lightning speed. Complicated
is planning for business survival whilst being ignored
by a Prime Minister who presided over the London 2012
Olympics and who we thought knew our value. Complicated
is convincing exhibitors that visitors will return to do
business face-to-face, whilst putting contingency plans in
place should localised lockdowns scupper restarts.
Venues, whether they’re state-of-the-art stadia or
exhibition centres, do complicated. Organisers of all types
of exhibitions and events, do complicated. We need to keep
telling government that they’ve left the best until last.
Mike Fletcher, Acting Editor
Printed by Pensord Press Ltd.
September — 05