Last week I was at the BAU in Munich, Europe’s key trade fair for building materials and systems for industrial, commercial and residential construction. Every two years, it brings together all the industry’s market leaders. It is an enormous event with well over 200k visitors, with over 2,000 exhibitors from over 40 countries filling 17 trade halls spread over 180,000 sqm.

In a time of industrial gloom, the show is strong and successful and I couldn’t help but compare and contrast this with UK exhibitions which in general seem to have been struggling in recent years. Trade fairs are taken very seriously in Europe. For many companies, the BAU is their most significant marketing event - a time to launch new products, meet new customers plus support existing clients and suppliers, distributors or fabricators.

For example, I was guest of Schuco International, a building envelope specialist who develop and market complete aluminium and steel systems, and solar products worldwide. They brought over 200 key people from the UK and many hundreds more from all over Europe. Their stand was enormous and demonstrated many new innovative products with full size working structures. The stand became a meeting place, crowded with key people being briefed on what was new from Schuco. It reminded me of a busy city centre business hotel with meetings at scores of tables. In this kind of atmosphere, you can see that their considerable investment in the show was paying dividends.

The UK is missing out because we don’t use trade shows in this kind of purposeful way. So we don’t have this inspiring kind of platform for innovation or product development or finding new markets. Some blame the exhibition organisers for this decline. But what struck me in Munich was the commitment from the exhibitors, each bringing their own clients and together providing a substantial event that no one, from
architect to fabricator, would miss. If shows like Interbuild and Ecobuild are to flourish then we have to create a much more focused time where the industry meets face to face. In this age of electronic communication, we still need that contact if we are to create quality relationships that foster good business - and trade shows can be a very efficient way of facilitating this. At least, that’s what I saw at the BAU.

Another key inspiration at the show was to see how the industry has truly embraced sustainable construction. As an example, Schuco showed a film that explained how they are helping create sustainable, future-proof buildings. Advances in automation to control doors, windows, facades, blinds, heating, lighting and much more give us intelligent, secure buildings that can exploit new energy-saving products. Going further, Schuco launched what they called Energy2, which looks at not only saving
energy but also using buildings to generate energy. This is an exciting prospect.

It was interesting that David Cameron, the Conservative leader, launched plans on Friday that he said would lower carbon emissions, create jobs and reduce oil and gas imports. He too talked about an ‘energy revolution’ including a GBP1bn upgrade for the national grid to encourage people to generate their own power and boost renewables. This is already happening elsewhere in Europe. I believe that the provision of such an infrastructure in the UK - enabling power generated from structures to be put into the national grid - would have the most profound impact on cutting carbon emissions. So let’s hope its not just more hot air from the politicians.

In Buildingtalk this week, besides providing a link to read more about Schuco’s vision for ’saving energy and generating energy’, we have news of a number of interesting new products. Passivent have natural ventilation systems that have, in some cases, reduced energy demand by up to 80%; Hager have a simplified installation and control of a ‘green’ heating system; Alfa Laval tell us about heat transfer equipment for district heating projects; and Dimplex report on a study which shows using their air curtains can save up to 33 percent of HVAC running costs.

Finally, a reminder that Buildingtalk, as a media partner at Ecobuild, is supporting those who are at this key exhibition in March. If you are already registered with Buildingtalk, do send details of why visitors should visit your stand and we will add this to Buildingtalk - the most visited industry news site in the UK. If you aren’t registered on Buildingtalk, there is an online form and further information
available at: (Link) This only takes a couple of minutes to complete, and there is no charge.
This comment was originally published in the Buildingtalk Newsletter