N.Y.'s DigitalLife Is Gasping For Breath
By Rachel Wimberly -- Tradeshow Week, 9/8/2008
DigitalLife – a thriving consumer show at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center of New York for the past four years – was negatively affected by the downturn in the economy and will not be held this year.
“We decided to postpone the show,” said Paul O'Reilly, vice president of Ziff Davis Media's event marketing group, the show's owner. “Our sign-ups had been significantly lower than previous years.”
According to O'Reilly, the show, which featured consumer electronics, was in trouble “pretty early on” because exhibitors weren't signing up for this year's event. “With the general state of the economy and cutbacks in marketing, we couldn't get the showfloor to what it was before,” he added.
Technology company Pepper, which exhibited at the show in the past and showed off its handheld computer, Pepper Pad 3, was one of the exhibitors that decided to skip this year's event. A spokeswoman for the company said, “We're not doing any tradeshows this year.”
Several other exhibiting companies that also previously participated in the show, including Axentra, oovo, oomaHub and iRobot were contacted by Tradeshow Week and either refused to comment or did not return calls.
DigitalLife, Ziff Davis' sole consumer show, was launched in 2004 at the Javits, and the inaugural event drew 30,000 attendees and 110 exhibitors to a 60,000 net square foot showfloor. By 2007, it had grown to 50,000 attendees, 150 exhibitors and 90,000 net sq. ft.
Doreen Guerin, vice president of marketing and sales at the Javits, said of the cancellation, “Obviously, we're saddened by the loss. We hoped they would be back this year. Because of the economy and the nature of their show, a consumer one, it's no surprise, but we're still sad.”
O'Reilly said 2006 was the show's best year, and last year was slightly down in exhibitors. When this year's numbers started tracking poorly, he added, “I think a lot of customers are sympathetic with the notion that, if it's not busy, then we should cancel.”
O'Reilly said he wanted to make the decision to cancel the show at the last moment possible – it was announced at the end of August – but not so late that exhibitors would have out-of-pocket losses.
“We'd like to bring it back,” he added. “We've spoken to a number of major sponsors, and our aim is to bring it back in 2009.”
One of the show's major draws, O'Reilly said, is the product launches, which in turn attract a lot of press. And, he added, a scenario that he didn't want was to go ahead and have the show, even with fewer exhibitors, and have the press report more about problems with the show than the new gizmos.
“I think everyone's grateful we were honest about the size of the show this year,” O'Reilly said. “It's refreshing really, and, hopefully, (the exhibitors) will be back next year.”
Even if the show is resurrected in the future, he added, one thing that might be different is its location. “We're reviewing the New York City location,” O'Reilly said. “It's very hard on the travel budgets, and it's very expensive to hold a show at the Javits.”
