IELA marks 30 years with a clear focus on expertise and the need to keep knowledge on the move in the logistics industry, Bob Moore explains…
The International Exhibition Logistics Association (IELA) turned 30 this year, and held its 30th Anniversary celebrations in Singapore. More than 200 delegates from 112 companies, from 41 countries, joined the event. The fourth partnering event, where non-members get the opportunity to network with IELA members, had 355 delegates representing 199 companies from 49 countries.
A total of 3,322 meetings took place during both networking sessions.
The major thrust of the congress was how IELA could work closer and assist exhibition organisers and venues globally manage and develop solutions that are often difficult logistically. Logistics can represent up to 12 per cent of exhibition costs and sadly can often be left to the last minute, or totally forgotten resulting in late or non deliveries.
As part of the meeting a panel of Asian regional experts, Mark Cochrane from UFI, Stephen Tan from Singapore Exhibition Services and Nat Wong from Reed China gave presentations and then formed a panel for open discussions. This enabled European and American members to gain great insight into the happenings in the Asian marketplace.
IELA members are official forwarders for a large percentage of exhibitions globally, and many members also are official on site service providers to venues across Europe the Middle East and Asia.
As such, IELA is focusing on a global campaign across the industry explain the role an IELA member plays in exhibitions and the benefits of organisers and venues working with their members.
IELA already has a strong bond with the organiser world through UFI where Ravinder Sethi and Bob Moore have participated regularly, Sethi as a board member. IELA also has many members participating on industry bodies globally. In Milan Guido Fornelli, chair of IELA’s organisers working group, will attend the UFI associations group meeting.
IELA’s standards and customs working group has taken over the health and safety mantra as clearly this important topic links in efficient and proper management with the association. This will be of particular benefit when organisers operate in new territories, as our expertise will assist planning greatly. Memorandums of Understanding have been signed with key exhibition industry groups globally.
The standards group is also key, as all members are measured annually by their peers via surveys. This culminates in awards but also enables IELA to monitor underperformers. Celebrating good performance is wonderful, but ensuring quality in maintained and underperformers are managed and assisted is more important for the IELA brand.
Education is also key to building bridges with the organiser fraternity. Bi-annually IELA holds its winter seminar in Zurich for 30 young IELA member employees. Lecturers across the industry train the students in many aspects of the exhibition world. Speakers from various organisers and UFI regularly contribute, which highlights the importance of the sector.
Adding to the educational aspect of IELA in January next year, IELA is holding an operational summit in Hong Kong for 100 mid-level managers, assembled from the association’s members. They will go through a programme designed to educate them in many facets of the exhibition industry with speakers drawn from organisers, venues and the logistics industry. This will also enhance the participants’ knowledge of the highly important Asian exhibition industry.
IELA has a very simple philosophy, which is to have well-focused industry experts globally supporting the exhibition industry. This will enable organisers, venues and our mutual clients – the exhibitors – to have a knowledge centre and the expertise to go to for the most difficult logistical solutions.
This is an ongoing campaign to assist the industry to grow globally.
