With record levels of exhibitors and an impressive range of innovative products as well as offers on top themes such as sustainability, contract business and healthy sleep, Heimtextil 2019 enjoyed a dynamic start to the new season for home and contract textiles. The event’s new hall concept met with broad approval.
About 3025 exhibitors from 65 countries (Compared to 2018: 2,975 exhibitors from 64 countries; 68,584 visitors from 135 countries, FKM-tested) took the international trade fair for home and contract textiles to a 15-year high: ‘Exhibitors and visitors accepted the new trade fair concept with great enthusiasm and confirmed the trade fair’s position as the world’s most important meeting place for the industry. The quality of the decision-makers impressed the exhibitors, as did the number of new business contacts from 156 countries, especially international ones – thus enabling Heimtextil to set a new benchmark’, says Detlef Braun, Member of the Board of Management of Messe Frankfurt.
‘Around 67,500 visitors ensured that there was a busy atmosphere in the halls, despite a slight decline due to various reasons, such as difficult travel conditions on account of the storms in the alpine region and airport strikes in Germany’.
One topic that occupied both exhibitors and visitors was the current and future economic situation. A further challenge is the increasingly evident changes that are happening in trade. Increasing revenues and revenue shares in online retailing stand in the way of the efforts made by the stationary retail trade to maintain their inner-city businesses. ‘The small business specialist trade, but also department stores and multibrand stores, and thus the heart of our visitor target groups, are under pressure from the constantly increasing levels of e-commerce. With Heimtextil and our consumer goods fairs in general, we offer these retailers in particular clear perspectives and diverse inspiration in an ambiguous world’, continues Braun.
The next Heimtextil in Frankfurt am Main – its 50th edition – will take place from 7 to 10 January 2020.