International News: Stockholm International Fairs

Stockholm exhibition grounds expand

By IBI Magazine/Lars-Åke Redéen. Sweden’s Stockholm International Fairs has added another 10,000sq m of exhibition space to its halls. The expansion was completed on January 1st and makes it possible to arrange even larger shows at the fair, where both the Scandinavian Boat Show and Allt för sjön (the Stockholm International Boat Show) are held annually.

The newly built part of the fair expands the company’s capacity by 20 per cent. “We’re affected by the economic downturn as much as everybody else, but most big arrangements are booked years in advance. Even if a single event becomes smaller for a year or two, the trend is that we’ll see larger conferences. The meetings between people are still very important,” says Patric Sjöberg, managing director of Stockholmsmässan.

“Several of our own shows have taken the whole building’s capacity,” he adds. “Now it’s easier to offer space to customers we earlier had to say ‘no’ to. We can also run more than one shows under the same theme at the same time, something we know that our visitors appreciate. We know that the visitors to our boat shows like to visit outdoor shows also.”

Stockholmsmässan is the leading show organiser in the Nordic region, arranging some 60 fairs each year as well as 100 national and international congresses. More than 10,000 exhibitors and 1.5 million visitors came to the Stockholmsmässan annually.