Acimall Aims to Make a Decision on The Future Venue for The Xylexpo Trade Fair

Acimall aims to make a decision on the future venue for the Xylexpo trade fair, which until now has always been held in Milan, at the latest by the end of 2012. At the end of September 2011, Acimall had commissioned a comparison of the four alternative venues Milan, Bologna, Verona and Rimini.
Acimall and various member companies appear to favour a continuation of Xylexpo in Milan. However, foreign Xylexpo exhibitors in particular are against Milan on account of continuing excessive costs and criticism of the range of services provided by the fair company Fiera Milano. Moreover, foreign exhibitors have in the past already repeatedly made it quite clear that they would not accept a move by Xylexpo to Rimini and therefore to the area of the corporate locations of the three Italian companies Biesse, Cefla and SCM. On the other hand, the latter three companies would find it difficult to return to Milan. For those reasons there have been recent negotiations within the Italian wood-processing-machinery industry on a compromise solution with Bologna as a potential venue.
Both exhibitor numbers and fair space showed decline at this year's Xylexpo. The number of exhibitors was down by another 21.2% to 514, of which 177 were from abroad. Fair space in the four remaining halls 1 to 4 showed an even greater rate of decline, at 24.6% to 32,066 m²; Xylexpo had still boasted six halls in 2010.