interpack 2011: One of the Most Successful Ever
DUSSELDORF, GERMANY—May 19, 2011—interpack Processes and Packaging 2011, closed as one of the most successful events in the 53-year history of the world’s leading international trade fair for the packaging sector and related processing industries. This was the unanimous sentiment among the 2,700 exhibitors from 60 nations presenting their products in all 19 fully booked halls at the fairgrounds in Düsseldorf, Germany from May 12-18, 2011.
Exhibitors at interpack 2011 were in an excellent mood and reported very good meetings with high-caliber visitors. Many of the attendees came with specific orders and exhibitors expect an extremely lucrative post-show business. Among the visitors were a particularly large number of international decision makers from the top management. “At our stand, there was huge interest in our products. We generated 30% more contacts than at interpack 2008, including members from the top management, brand manufacturers and many potential new customers. We heard the same from numerous other exhibitors. interpack has confirmed the stability of the positive economic trends,” stated Christian Traumann, President of interpack 2011 and Managing Director of exhibitor Multivac Sepp Haggenmüller.
The results of the visitor survey confirmed the impressions of the exhibitors. Particularly remarkable is the further significant increase in the proportion of decision makers compared to interpack 2008. Almost three quarters of the trade visitors were from the management level—an absolutely exceptional figure. The especially large proportion of trade visitors from the top management was a contributing factor. interpack’s internationality again underlined its status as the world’s most important trade fair for this sector. Over 100,000 (or 60%) of the 166,000 trade visitors travelled to interpack from countries outside of Germany. The visitor’s reaction to the range of exhibits at interpack 2011 could not have been better. Sustainability, safety and convenience were the major topics in the exhibition halls.
Due to the Eurovision Song Contest, there was a shift in the pattern of visits. Many attendees visited interpack 2011 after the song contest ended on May 14 in a venue close to the fairgrounds.
A special highlight at interpack 2011 was the U.S. Pavilion, organized by Messe Düsseldorf North America. A total of 33 exhibitors showcased their latest technologies within this successful group exhibit. Overall, 98 U.S. exhibitors took part in the trade fair.
The choice and presentation of the special themes also added to the appeal of interpack 2011. According to participating companies and visitors alike, these themes are unparalleled in quality worldwide and made interpack all the more a unique communication platform.
The premiere of the Save Food campaign which demonstrated how each stage in the packaging value chain can help in the worldwide fight against wasting of food, was organized by Messe Düsseldorf in cooperation with the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations. Over 300 participants from all over the world—ranging from producers and the packaging industry to retailers and politicians as well as society and non-government organizations—took part in this congress on May 16 and 17. First-rate speakers such as Ilse Aigner (Federal Minister of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection), Prof. Klaus Töpfer (former Executive Director of the UN Environment Program and Chairman of the Ethics Committee for Atomic Energy recently set up by Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel) and Shraddha Shridhar Jadhav (Mayor of Mumbai), highlighted the problem of global food loss from various points of view.
“The success of the Save Food initiative shows that we at Messe Düsseldorf have placed our international packaging expertise in a context enabling areas outside the packaging industry to benefit. We have set off a highly promising dialogue on one of the most important issues of our time. We shall therefore continue to pursue the topic in cooperation with the FAO. I’ve agreed to this with Mr. Traoré, Assistant Director General, Agriculture and Consumer Protection of the FAO,” explained Werner Matthias Dornscheidt, President and CEO of Messe Düsseldorf. In October of this year, the Save Food exhibition from interpack 2011 will be on show at the FAO headquarters in Rome during the week of the World Food Day.
The special themes Innovationparc Packaging and Metal Packaging Plaza during interpack 2011 were also extremely popular. In five different shops on the themes of Health, Meaning, Aesthetics, Simplicity and Identity, Innovationparc Packaging brought together companies from across the value chain with the motto of “Quality of Life”. Developed specifically for the special show, best practices and visions for the future were presented by these stores. According to the participating companies and visitors, this concept created a unique forum for constructive talks and creative ideas.
The special theme Metal Packaging Plaza, newly introduced at interpack 2011, was also devoted to dialogue and information. Numerous presentations were held in the central lecture forum, while suppliers and potential customers met in the lounge to discuss metal packaging. The Metal Packaging Plaza thus became a central meeting place for anything relating to metal packaging, much to the satisfaction of the participating associations for metal packages, VMV and Empac.
The next staging of interpack will take place in 2014 in Düsseldorf, Germany. Exact dates will be announced at a later date. For further information on visiting or exhibiting at interpack 2014, contact Messe Düsseldorf North America, 150 North Michigan Avenue, Suite 2920, Chicago, IL 60601. Telephone: (312) 781-5180; Fax: (312) 781-5188; E-mail: info@mdna.com; Visit our web site http://www.mdna.com; Subscribe to our blog at http://blog.mdna.com; Follow us on twitter at http://twitter.com/mdnachicago
interpack 2011 Exhibitor Statements
Multivac Sepp Haggenmüller, Christian Traumann, Managing Director
“interpack 2011 has been a great success for us. We were able to present our many innovations and our range of products and services in an ideal way and reached our target customer groups. We generated 30% more contacts than in 2008. interpack is quite simply the platform to communicate new developments to the wider international community. This year we had eleven new product developments on our stand. We were especially pleased with the high quality of the trade visitors to our stand, with whom we had very fruitful exchanges.”
Theegarten-PACTEC, Markus Rustler, Managing Director
“As always, the trade fair was perfectly organized. In our view, the quality of visitors was even better by far than in previous years. Therefore we are extremely satisfied in that respect. We have definitely reached the groups we were targeting, made new contacts and reconnected with existing ones—we’re therefore one-hundred percent happy. You can count on us coming back in 2014!”
Schubert, Gerhard Schubert, Chief Executive
“interpack was just terrific, as always. I’ve never experienced a better interpack than this one—and I’ve been at every single interpack since 1959. It is the No. 1 and I’m sure it always will be. interpack is the “place to be” for international packaging machinery manufacturers. We all see to it that we have real innovations to present at the interpack—and that’s precisely what makes it so attractive. The mood is good, and the visitor quality was outstanding. I’m really sad that interpack 2011 is over. The only consolation is being able to look forward to the next one in three years’ time!”
Krones, Volker Kronseder, CEO
“interpack 2011 has been a successful event for us. The breadth of packaging machinery and new items to be found here is unique in the industry. And our own product innovations in sustainable packagings attracted a lot of interest among the international attendees. A fantastic trade fair.”
Ishida, Paul Griffin, Marketing Director
“interpack is indisputably the most important exhibition for the packaging industry—all the major companies from Europe, Asia and the U.S. are here. We simply cannot afford not to exhibit at this show.”
Mondi, Albert Klinkhammer, Marketing & Communication Director Europe & International
“interpack 2011 has proved to be an excellent communication and networking platform for Mondi. We expect that the number of leads will significantly exceed those recorded at the last edition in 2008. The location of our stand in Hall 9 was a definite advantage. One especially pleasing aspect is the consistently high quality of the talks we had with customers and other trade fair visitors. Besides food and the Green Range (e.g. the Terra Bag or the single-layer sack called ONE from Mondi Industrial Bags), the main talking points at the Mondi stand were product solutions offering reliable packaging with less weight while providing excellent printability for marketing at the point of sale. In the food sector, our shelf ready packaging solution and Mondi’s new anti-staining pouch drew a lot of attention. Paper was another topic much in demand, which was particularly gratifying for the staff representing our kraft paper and containerboard divisions. Mondi can look back on a successful presence at interpack 2011.”
Braskem, Amanda Klein, Marketing
“This is the first time that we have exhibited at interpack, and we are very satisfied. Our range of biopolymers attracted a high level of interest among trade visitors from all over the world, and we are confident that we will be participating again at the next interpack—ideally with even more stand space than this time.”
Mayr-Melnhof Packaging International, Klaus J. Marszollek, Sales Director Germany
“interpack 2011 has gone extremely well for our company. We have been able to meet up with existing contacts and make new ones. Our main topics at the trade show were migration and product safety, challenges that our range can help to master. We were able to connect with our target customer groups precisely as we wished. I noticed that there were many visitors from outside Europe, and a growing proportion of them came from South America. All in all, this was a very successful trade fair and we have great expectations regarding post-fair business.”
Wipak Walsrode, Matti Rovamaa, Vice President and General Manager of the Wipak Group
“This fair was just brilliantly for us! Besides presenting packages, our aim was to create a platform for dialogue. And we did exactly that. Our highlight was the “talking package”, which was very well received. We already recorded the first enquiries at the trade fair, so we are anticipating good post-fair business.”
Bizerba Group, Claudia Gross, Director Marketing & Communication
“This fair has been perfect for us. We had a very high-caliber audience with many decision makers visiting our stand. The response was much greater than at previous staging in 2008—when it was already excellent. So we are seeing a real increase here. It is also very noticeable that the economy is taking off again. Our expectations have been met in full, and we were also very satisfied with the location of our stand.”
Contego, Holger Lümkemann, Sales Director
“This was our first appearance at interpack under our new name Contego and with a restructured product portfolio. The presentation of the new company was a great success. We had a lot of international visitors, some of whom had travelled very long distances.”
European Bioplastics e.V., Hasso von Pogrell, Managing Director
“interpack is a truly outstanding stage for presenting innovative packaging materials. We were able to welcome a large number of trade visitors at our stand and point out new trends to them. By presenting the new Danone Activia yoghurt cup made of PLA bioplastic we have been able to reach a whole new group of customers overnight, and bioplastics have finally crossed the consumer threshold. I am confident that this will give the entire industry a huge boost. We are expecting production capacities to more than double over the next five years. Bioplastics will continue to make inroads in the markets—especially in the packaging sector.”
Innovationparc Packaging
EHI Retail Institute, Hilka Bergmann, Project Manager for Packaging Research
“We’ve received exceptionally positive feedback from all the exhibitors at Innovationparc Packaging. The individual areas all drew high quality visitors, and the concept of showing packages in a retail environment in the various shops was a resounding success. The interest was definitely there, as shown by the numbers and the quality of the trade visitors. Although 2008 was already very successful for us and exhibitor expectations were consequently high, we were able to meet these once again in full.”
PDA Pan European Brand Design Association, Claudia Josephs, Operation Manager
“For us, it was very positive that, this time around, Innovationparc Packaging turned the spotlight on the consumer. Another very good idea was presenting the different topics at different stands. Designers and materials manufacturers worked together well, and thanks to the visual appeal of the stand designs, Innovationparc Packaging was a real eye-catcher. That was also well received and appreciated by the visitors. Our main focus was on networking, and collaborating with industry in this area definitely generates competitive advantages. For PDA, our participation was a big investment, but one that we were happy to make as we have learned a lot from this experience. We are going home full of inspiration, and with the will to do even better next time!”
Smurfit Kappa, Maren Grohs, Public Relations
“The Innovationparc Packaging concept really appeals to us because it allows alternative forms of presentation. The talks we had were very rewarding. I think they will lead to interesting contacts for the future.”
STI Group, Prof. Dr. Frank Ohle, CEO
“The Innovationparc Packaging at interpack 2011 provided an outstanding forum for presenting new ideas and discussing them with potential customers from all over the world. It spotlighted solutions that matched visitors’ interests. Through joint projects with other exhibitors and dialogue with experts from international brand manufacturers and retailers a trade fair presence becomes a source of solutions for tomorrow’s markets. There was a “get up and go” atmosphere at the trade fair and many of the new contacts established there will lead to concrete projects.”
Bialas Runge Partner, Albrecht Bialas, owner
“The Innovationparc Packaging strategy worked really well. We already took part in it in 2008, and this time we had even more quite specific enquiries, for example from brand manufacturers who were looking for concrete packaging solutions. Overall, the fact that the technical and creative design people got together very early to work on this project proved extremely fruitful.”
depot wpf, Anna Lukanina, Executive Director
“As we create commercial design, which is more comprehensive than just pure design, we really think that the Innovationparc Packaging is very useful in terms of bringing together the different stages of the value chain. I also got useful contacts and ideas while visiting the other shops of the Innovationparc Packaging.”
Metal Packaging Plaza
Verband Metallverpackungen e.V. (VMV/Metal Packaging Association), Jörg Höppner, Managing Director
“First of all, we would like to say a big thank-you to interpack for initiate the Metal Packaging Plaza project and inspiring manufacturers of metal packages to take part in it. When we approached our members with the idea that each of them should stage their appearance individually but on a common theme platform, they welcomed it with open arms. The central topics here were recycling and sustainability. Both we and our European umbrella association EMPAC rate our participation here as highly successful, and we are confident that the industry will be ready and willing to support this special show again in the future—perhaps to an even greater extent."
Huber Packaging Group, Bernhard Kürschner, Head of Marketing and Public Relations
“We are very happy with the visitor count. Monday and Tuesday were the busiest days for us. One of the things we most appreciate is the opportunity this trade fair provides to meet so many of our customers within a short space of time and personally present our range to them. This is especially true of the Metal Packaging Plaza initiative and the accompanying forum. Both of these gave us a unique opportunity to present not just our company but also our material and packages made from it. Steel has gained the status we believe it deserves at this year’s interpack. The aim of giving metal packages a new face and a louder voice was clearly achieved. And of course, we also benefited from the international character of the trade fair.”
Source: press release.