To immediately start off on a successful note, it was necessary to cut the show’s ties with the past, and so, the new Gallery Shoes gets ready to present itself to international footwear operators, proposing three essential factors that will be key to determining its success. First off, is the location, the multiple award-winning venue of Areal Böhler in Düsseldorf, with its industrial charm and functional efficiency. We then have the show dates, which will be held later on the international trade fair calendar from 27 to 29 August (Sunday to Tuesday), than those traditionally scheduled for GDS. The third factor is the strong focus on the medium to high-priced segments in the European footwear industry, with the participation of both young and emerging labels and tradition-rich footwear brands.
The exhibition areas will be of 150 square meters and 35 square meters each in the Concept Area. Moreover, there will be an important 65% share of international exhibitors, coming especially from countries like Italy, Spain, Portugal, France and the Netherlands. The event, instead, will not include a sourcing segment.
In terms of visitors, the target countries of reference will be located in Northern, Central, and Eastern Europe, since it is here that the Igedo Company will be able to benefit from the expertise acquired with CPM (Collection Premiere Moscow), which has been active since 2003. Gallery Shoes aims to leverage these synergies in order to involve the apparel sector, also in terms of marketing, present with accessories. The choice in show dates for the new fair, which will start on Sunday, is in fact aimed at bringing independent specialist shoe retailers back to the fair.
A strong Trade Show is what drives the industry, and what we can offer today is exactly a strong Trade Show if we all pull together in the same direction. Gallery Shoes provides information through a new design, with a new language and on an international scale.
commented Ulrike Kähler, Project Director of Gallery Shoes.
Info: www.igedo.com
The farewell of GDS to the footwear industry
Werner Matthias Dornscheidt, President and CEO of Messe Düsseldorf, underlined how the Director of GDS, Kirstin Deutelmoser, together with her team, made extraordinary efforts over the years, introducing constant innovations to the event and offering visitors a wide and complete panorama of the footwear industry. However, the success story of the Show started to suffer from its limitations, becoming a burden rather than a benefit. The glorious past of GDS, when a record number of visitors was registered at the beginning of the new millennium, over the years that followed became a meter for measuring the results of each subsequent edition, which never seemed to measure up.