New Dairy Packaging Show Launches

Goodbye, Worldwide Food Expo. Hello, Intl. Dairy Show.

From now on, the two shows that were collocated as the Worldwide Food Expo since the late 1990s will be held separately.

The Intl. Dairy Foods Assn. announced during the biennial Worldwide Food Expo, held Oct. 28-31 at Chicago's McCormick Place, that it will launch the Intl. Dairy Show next year, Sept. 13-15 in Dallas. IDFA officials are looking for sites for future shows.

The other half of the previous collocation, the American Meat Institute's Intl. Meat, Poultry & Seafood Industry Convention and Exposition next will be held April 13-16, 2011, at McCormick Place.

“The launch of a new, annual Intl. Dairy Show in 2010 gives the dairy industry a great opportunity to focus on industry trends and to keep up with a rapidly changing marketplace,” said Gary Vanic, president and CEO of Great Lakes Cheese and chairman of the IDFA board of directors.

AMI officials said the shift of their show from fall to spring has received wide support from attendees and exhibitors.

“We're going to build on what we know works from the dairy portion of the Worldwide Food Expo,” said Peggy Armstrong, director of communications for IDFA. Its portion of Worldwide Food Expo was called the IDFA Food, Dairy & Beverage Expo.

She added IDFA officials read attendee and exhibitor feedback from previous shows and found that those groups preferred an annual, rather than biennial, event because of the growing innovation in the industry and the demand to keep up with it.

“That was too long (between shows), especially for the education,” Armstrong said.

That feedback also is responsible for the new show's rotational pattern.

“They didn't want to only go to Chicago,” she added. “They wanted to move around the country.”

The Intl. Dairy Show will focus on the packaging, processing and technology solutions for the dairy industry, just as the show previously did. Exhibitors were manufacturers of those solutions, and those who attended the show were the companies purchasing those products.

“There are separate shows that deal with the farm aspect (in the dairy industry),” Armstrong said, referring to shows such as World Dairy Expo, which is held annually at Alliant Energy Center in Madison, Wis.

Components of next year's Intl. Dairy Show will include a sustainability pavilion for packaging, features of innovation in products and packaging, networking opportunities and education programs.

Armstrong said the association previously had six education tracks, plus a few other pre-expo workshops.

“With the new show, we will be able to focus on the topics, issues and products dairy professionals care about most,” said Connie Tipton, IDFA president and CEO. “It will provide the learning, networking and tradeshow experience the dairy industry depends on to stay on top of the latest trends and issues.”

This year's Worldwide Food Expo attracted more than 21,000 attendees, including 6,500 buyers and nearly 700 exhibitors, according to show management.