Madrid's IFEMA Boasts 12-Percent Growth
By Gary Tufel -- Tradeshow Week, 9/6/2004
Feria de Madrid (IFEMA) appears on track to post the best year in its quarter-century history with €97.2 million ($117.5 million) revenue in the first six months of the year, a 12-percent hike over the same period in 2002.
Among other accomplishments in 2004, IFEMA:
- held 43 trade fairs that occupied 800,000 net square meters (8.8 million net square feet), featuring 13,254 exhibiting companies and 2.8 million attendees;
- expects to end 2004 with a net profit of €27.3 million ($33 million), a 39.1-percent increase over 2003 and a 71.5-percent hike over 2002;
- plans for expansion in 2005, when revenue of €144.4 million ($174.4 million) is expected from 68 fairs encompassing 1.1 million net square meters (11 million net sq. ft.), 18,000 exhibitors and 4 million attendees;
- approved a 15-percent increase in the budget for a Phase II expansion of the Juan Carlos I Exhibition Centre, now estimated at €115 million ($139 million). (The project will include the addition of two new halls with 550,000 sq. ft. of new exhibition space, for a total of 1.2 million sq. ft., and will be completed by 2007.)
In addition, IFEMA and the U.S. Foreign Trade Service have renewed their collaboration agreement for two more years. Originally signed in July 2002, the agreement already has spurred an increase in participation by U.S. companies in Madrid trade fairs by 86 percent, and a 120-percent hike in U.S. attendees. The collaboration focuses on 20 Madrid shows, and includes promotion of the events in the United States.
Vicente Rodriguez, director general of E. J. Krause Spain (which, among other shows, produces EXPO COMM Spain in the IFEMA venue), said IFEMA has a very aggressive and successful management that, even without the trade fair tradition of Barcelona or Valencia, has made it the largest tradeshow institution in Spain, and the most profitable per employee in Europe. And, he added, IFEMA is continuing to expand.
