Last week’s CEDIA Home Technology Event has produced a warm response from exhibitors – both regulars at the former CEDIA Expo and newcomers this year.
Stuart Tickle (pictured), managing director of AWE Europe, commented: “CEDIA HTE2010 was amazing. There was fresh interest on the show floor with solid visitor numbers spread across the three days, Wednesday being outstanding as always... We were delighted that there was a high proportion of business leaders in attendance. The dedicated CI nature of the show and relative size meant they also had time to hold in-depth discussions about multiple product lines."
“The traffic on the stand has been better than in 2009 – it’s been manic at times,” said George Gavutis, international sales manager at NuVo Technologies. “We’ve enjoyed conversations with lots of really good people, looking to integrate NuVo whole home audio into their projects.”
LINDY Electronics joined CEDIA earlier this year, and so this was the company’s first time exhibiting at the UK show. “I’d say that half of the visitors to our stand have been brand new contacts, which is great,” said Mike Baker, UK sales manager.
His comments were echoed by Nick Augerach, divisional director at Kerry London: “As new members of CEDIA, the show was important for us in getting our name out to the industry. We achieved that objective and had many good conversations with visitors. The event worked really well.”
Wayne Jackson, trainer/merchandiser at first-time exhibitor Freesat, said declared himself “very impressed” with the show, which he called “a real eye-opener. Lots of good quality visitors, and it was a great platform for us to show the market what Freesat was all about.”
Connectivity UK introduced its HDMI over IP business for the very first time at the show. “The event lived up to our expectations, and it’s certainly proved to be the show if you want to reach the CI market," said Chris Pinder, managing director.
Michael Roberts of Cave said his company had “a brilliant first year” at the show. “We had good quality throughout, and Wednesday was especially busy... The traffic from the show floor conference sessions was also good.”
Also delighted with its CEDIA HTE debut was Enrico Giannone, marketing manager of the building management wiring devices business unit at Legrand. “It’s exceeded our expectations – we’ve been sending our colleagues texts saying how good it is here!” he said.
As well as attracting new companies on the exhibition floor, it’s clear that the show drew new visitors as well. “There are loads of new CI people here, not just the same old faces,” said Michael Kay of Marata Vision. “It’s a breath of fresh air to meet m&e consultants and interior designers on the stand as well. We’ll be back next year.”
Carl Sambrell, managing director of Atacama had similar feelings: “It’s really refreshing to see so many new faces at this year’s event. The quality of visitors to our stand has been really spot on.”
Petra van Meeuwen, marketing manager of Crestron, noted the diversity of attendees: “Our new Prodigy range proved of great interest with the show’s visitors, with significant interest not only from integrators interested to hear about this affordable home automation and control package, but also from developers and architects visiting the Home Technology Event," she said. "We also noticed that there were many more electrical contractors this year, and as the main sponsor of the Interior Designers’ Conference, we were pleased to be attracting this important audience sector to the event.”
Graham Randall, sales manager at Future Automation, said: “There were good quality visitors at this year’s show. We got to see our key customers all in one place, which was great, and spend some excellent time with them.”
The last word goes to Nick Smith, sales director at Aldous Systems (Europe). “We’ve done really, really well here. From a numbers perspective it’s definitely up, but it’s the consistency that’s been impressive,” he said. “Steady traffic throughout and lots of custom installers plus electrical contractors coming into the market and coming to our stand to find out about products and training. We’ve been one the busiest stands at the show. No question, we’ll be back next year.”
www.hometechnologyevent.co.uk
