Scrapbook Hobby Leads to Show Launch
Staff -- Tradeshow Week, 10/4/2004
The scrapbooking hobby of one-third of a show management company's staff led to the inception of a tradeshow devoted to the craft: ScrapbookBIZ.
The annual business-to-business exhibition and educational conference, to be introduced April 20–22, 2005 at the Greater Columbus Convention Center in Columbus, Ohio, is the first of its kind for Henderson, Nev.-based ConvExx. The company organizes the bulk of its events with the involvement of an association, such as its SEMA Show, No. 4 on the Tradeshow Week 200, sponsored by the Specialty Equipment Market Assn.
ConvExx is eager to venture into doing shows on its own, said marketing manager Jeff Hein. "This is kind of like our baby," he said.
A baby catering to a $2.5-billion industry, that is. The pastime of scrapbooking — assembling photos, journal-like entries, stickers and memorabilia together in a decorated photo album — has dramatically increased in the last three years, according to Creating Keepsakes magazine. Scrapbooking households have increased by 4.4 million since 2001, which fueled annual industry sales growth of 27.8 percent.
Primedia's Memory Trends tradeshow, set for Sept. 28–30 at the Sands Expo & Convention Center in Las Vegas, has also identified scrapbooking as a niche. The Craft & Hobby Assn. Annual Convention & Tradeshow (formerly Hobby Industry of America and No. 67 on the TSW 200) has a product category for scrapbooking and paper crafts.
ScrapbookBIZ will be situated in a 98,000 square foot hall and is expected to attract nearly 5,000 attendees and 300 exhibiting companies. It is meant to "help an industry come into its own," said Susan Schwartz, ConvExx president, who has been scrapbooking for a year.
Schwartz said creating more of a story of the events than just a photo album drew her to the hobby. "I got hooked," she added.
