With over 15,500 industry professionals onsite for the three days of the show (8% more than in 2013), and 80% of all attendees (excluding exhibitors) coming from Europe, things look good for the MICE industry on the whole.
Held from 18-20 November in Barcelona, EIBTM attracted nearly 70% of trade visitors from Spain supporting the country’s positive economic recovery which was highlighted in the AMEX report, presented on the eve of the show before over 200 global industry thought leaders.
The three-day show saw 78,436 pre-scheduled appointments, a 20% increase over last year.
Jim Hensley, CEO, Global DMC Partners: "EIBTM is the strongest and busiest show in our trade show calendar. We’ve had more appointments each day here than we have had in entire trade shows. The buyers we have seen have been good quality and most importantly ready to do business with proposals in place, rather than general enquiries. We are very optimistic about the future business we will place thanks to EIBTM."
David Chalmers, Marketing Director Europe for Cvent Inc.: "We have been oversubscribed on appointments this year making it our best ever EIBTM. All members of our sales team have fed back on the fantastic quality of buyers whom they have met with and a significant amount of business has been made here as a result of that."
Association planners are also forecasting an increase in their meetings activity, with this year’s show seeing the highest number of independent association planners attending (67% of the 271 planners coming from individual associations and societies). The event saw an overall increase of 12% in attendance by association hosted buyers, helped by the launch of a more flexible approach to this year’s buyer programme, with the introduction of My Association | My Club.
In his annual Industry Trends Report, Rob Davidson highlighted the optimism of the mood in the US meetings market as "very positive according to various studies."
From the close of this year’s show, EIBTM is to be rebranded as IBTM World - where connections mean everything. IBTM World will join its sister events IBTM Arabia, IBTM Africa, IBTM America, IBTM China and IBTM India under the IBTM Events umbrella, along with AIME in Melbourne and the recently announced ICOMEX in Mexico.
IBTM World will take place in Barcelona from 17-19 November 2015.
