BikeBiz Bicycle and cycling retail news
Next year Eurobike sticks with its end of August start but from 2018 it moves forward a month, and will start on July 8th.
Eurobike Manager Stefan Reisinger said the change for 2018 is “to secure the future relevance of Eurobike.” Visitor numbers at this year’s show were down.
Messe Friedrichshafen’s CEO Klaus Wellmann said: “By taking place earlier in the year Eurobike will be even more relevant and strengthen its position as the leading trade show for new trends and innovations. The new dates and schedule have the backing of a large number of industry players.”
Those backing the switch include Claudio Marra, managing director of FSA, who said:
“We strongly believe that it is necessary to bring the show forward to an earlier date, because September is now too late for our current market. As we know, all the new bikes and components are already available or have been covered by other events and media. As a result, we miss out on the original nature of the Eurobike, to present new product innovations.”
Bernhard Lange, managing director of Paul Lange & Co. also welcomed the move:
“The fall in visitor numbers, especially trade visitors, cannot be ignored. We feel that it’s important to look at how we can reverse this trend, rather than calling the whole trade show into question. Moving towards an increasingly B2B orientation is the right way to go.
“Experiences of the past few weeks show that the industry urgently needs a central forum. There is hardly room in the calendar for even more new in-house trade shows, retailer events or product presentations. Already this year, there were numerous scheduling clashes, which caused retailers major diary headaches. What’s more, weak spring sales, due to bad weather, led many retailers to spend every fine-weather weekend in the stores selling, instead of travelling from one event to the next.”
