Trade fair brand in transition

Mr Möller, the world is becoming ever more digital, including in the areas of lighting and electronics. Even the largest meetings are held over video nowadays, and products are presented online in elaborate 3D installations. So aren't in-person events like Light + Building a little out of date?

Our trade fair business here in Frankfurt boasts 800 years of company history. We've experienced a lot but like-minded people have been coming together here to trade with one another and exchange knowledge for 800 years. There have been just two major moments of doubt. The first was with the explosion of the Internet at the beginning of the century. That was the first time we asked ourselves, is there really still a need for this? In the future, won't we just be doing all this over Second Life and email? No, as it turned out, we wouldn't.

The second major moment was the COVID pandemic, and again we've since returned to 'normal'. We've certainly learnt that some things are perfectly suited to being moved online, such as business meetings and smaller meetings. But actually meeting customers, presenting products, this requires us to return to the big trade fairs.

The last four years have been a turbulent time for in-person events. How has Light + Building dealt with this and how are things looking for the trade fair today?

Yes, it really was a difficult time for us. We were practically under an occupational ban. We were no longer allowed to do the thing that really constitutes our purpose at Messe Frankfurt, that being bringing together as many people as possible. And our business model only really works when the world is at peace, when free trade is possible and when borders are open. Specifically, when we can travel freely. So our business model almost completely ground to a halt during those four years. But I think we really made the most of it by refining our event. We came out of the pandemic stronger than ever, because it was more clear what our focus is, what people need from the fair, what cannot be replaced and therefore where we need to concentrate our energies.

In your position, you are largely responsible for Light + Building getting back on track. But perhaps you can explain once more what exactly a brand manager does.

The title, Head of Brand Management Light + Building, doesn't exactly make clear the role behind it. Primarily, I'm the project manager of Light + Building in Frankfurt. I'm responsible for strategic direction, as well as for the overall economic viability of the event. The Light + Building network is made up of 13 trade fairs both within Germany and abroad. These range from the huge Guangzhou International Lighting Exhibition, to impressive events in Istanbul, India, Shanghai, Dubai and Argentina, as well as the LightFair in Las Vegas.

These fairs all belong to our show portfolio and are all organised by us, meaning they have the same "Made by Messe Frankfurt" quality seal. And the role of brand manager involves strategically aligning all these events and ensuring that they develop in the same direction, addressing the same topics, updating product groups, but also taking advantage of synergies between the events.

And what does a typical workday look like for you?

Well, the great thing is that there's no such thing as a 'normal' workday. Over the next few weeks, for example, I'll be visiting the overseas events in person. Our Guangzhou International Lighting Exhibition is just around the corner, so that will involve opening the trade fair, meeting partners on site, visiting key accounts and, in the preparatory and follow-up phases of the fair, key account management.

A large part of my job is also managing Light + Building partners. We work with the major industry association ZVEI, with their Lighting section and Buildings platform. Many of our key players and top exhibitors are organised under or members of these groups. And on the visitor side, there is the ZVEH, the Central Association of German Electrical and Information Technology Trades. Together, we strategically organise the trade fairs, tweak them, discover new hot topics, discuss marketing and develop them further. So a lot of my time is spent maintaining contact with our partners and strategically expanding on our relationships.

You really don't have a desk job, then.

Visiting customers is also a part of it, for example. Although I think that's the most fun part. Travelling to visit customers, to see production, to see what they're working on. That's inspiring. How customers are organised, how their processes run, what their offices look like, what kind of atmosphere there is – it's fun, seeing all that.

And although, fortunately, there aren't that many, there are always one or two competitor trade fairs to visit. What are our competitors doing, how are they developing, how are other trade fair venues organised? Being involved in trade fairs, you look at things in a particular way. It makes you a real stickler for details, so you hone in on small things immediately: how do they do hang their displays, how do they lay the carpet, why are admissions organised that way? After all, in some cases it's not really about the theme of the other fair, but the processes they use. So we can learn just as much in China as in Germany.

The trade fair motto is very closely connected to the brand. This year it's "Be electrified". How did you come up with this?

Light + Building is the world's leading trade fair for lighting and building technology, and just from the name, you can tell that it is very wide-ranging: we go from technical lighting components to complete lights in the area of technical lighting, but then we also deal with design-oriented light, all the way to urban lighting. And in the western area of the exhibition grounds, we take the whole topic further, incorporating conventional electrical installation, plug sockets, switches and motion detectors, photovoltaics, energy storage, electrical heating, wallboxes and e-charging.

There is therefore an incredibly broad range at Light + Building. And when it comes to finding a motto or the hot topics for the fair, it is of course also about coming up with a headline that will appeal to every exhibitor and make everyone feel at home. And with "Be electrified", I think we've done just that. Everything at Light + Building is in some way electrified or powered. What's more, electrification is currently a hot topic in both global politics and the daily news, with a focus on e-charging, heating and energy distribution. And since we know that buildings account for 40 % of total energy consumption, the issue of energy efficiency is a major priority. This makes electrification even more significant.

And what does the process of choosing the motto look like?

It's always in collaboration with the strategic partners that I mentioned earlier. Of course, the trade fair can't just come up with a motto or a list of hot topics out of nowhere. Those are defined by the exhibitors who attend and make the fair what it is. So, to begin with, we conduct workshops with the Light + Building team and the marketing communication department; we come up with the idea and some alternatives, then take them to our strategy circle or our advisory committee. We sit down with selected top representatives from the industry and jointly reach a decision. What's important to note is that we never do this alone – it's in cooperation with others. And the associations we coordinate with are ultimately none other than the representatives of our top customers.

So it clearly takes a while to develop a motto, then. What other challenges are there in your work?

Without a doubt, constantly reinventing the fair and ensuring it remains attractive. At the same time, and this is really an entirely personal answer, I'm not simply selling a product that I have in stock and am able to reproduce. I sell square metres, and each one can only be sold once. There's only one spot by the entrance and only one spot next to Customer X, and so on. And so I really am always working with my team, day in, day out, to reach the best compromise.

As you can imagine, I can't just give everyone what they want. That would never work. The perfect situation would be if we had just one enormous hall in which everyone could set up their stalls right next to everyone that they want to be right next to, such as the companies they have cooperation agreements with. But it simply doesn't work that way. So we're always working to reach the best compromise and fit the giant puzzle together. That takes a lot of time, and many, many discussions. It's something we work on throughout the whole year.

You've worked for Messe Frankfurt for more than 16 years. Looking back, what are the issues that have changed or come to prominence during that time?

Yes, it has indeed been quite a long time. The trade fair business has kind of remained constant, as we still always work to bring together the supply side and the demand side on the exhibition grounds. But it has become more media-driven. Communication was completely transformed during the pandemic years, with many old traditions being done away with. Communication with the exhibitors has changed a lot and has become a lot more intensive.

Customers want quicker response times, and always the flexibility to also make a video call if required. The frequency with which a customer has to be looked after, the number of touchpoints you have with each one per week, that has increased significantly over the years. There's just no comparison to the old days, with written registration forms that arrived in the post and a questionnaire that you sent back by post or fax.

Those were simply different times. That said, I really like this fast pace a lot, and I also think it's good that we are in more frequent contact with customers.

You're also talking here about the increase in digital communication. When you took on the role of Brand Manager four years ago, you said that you wanted to make the trade fair even more digitally accessible.

Yes, and we have absolutely done so. And not just because we wanted to, but because it was clearly what our customers wanted. At that time, no one knew when we would be able to travel and meet in person again. Expanding our digital offering was the only way to go. And in 2024, we launched another Digital Extension. I encourage everyone to go and take a look. I find it similar to certain aspects of LinkedIn, my business network. On the Digital Extension, I can find a clear list of information on who visited the fair, who was registered, who I was perhaps unable to meet, and I can now get another opportunity to connect with them. As a visitor, I can do the same with the company profiles. For example, who is my point of contact for a particular product area or country? I can exchange contact details, join a video call or connect more closely.

However, we do also have to point out that what our customers expect from us is a professionally organised face-to-face meeting. So the physical event in Frankfurt is still at our core. The idea of the Digital Extension was always to extend the fair experience, to make its contents usable even after the event and to enable people to catch up on programme highlights that they might have missed after the fair ends.

One further topic that has gained considerable importance in recent years is sustainability. The 2024 fair motto was also created, to some extent, against a background of sustainability. What other influence does this topic have on the trade fair?

It is certainly one of the biggest topics. The Light + Building event in itself already stands for sustainability. So the products that will be on show, the offers that are needed to move towards a more sustainable future, to manage energy efficiency and energy, that's what our major exhibitors in the western area stand for. At the same time, it's a topic that must actually be visible on the exhibition grounds. And there are many examples of this. For example, for years we've relied solely on green electricity, which is why we're involved in a solar park in the Uckermark region. We've made significant progress in the areas of waste recycling and water management and are continually improving further.

If we properly understand sustainability as the triad that it is, i.e. if we also incorporate the social aspects, our membership in the UN Global Compact is a commitment to all those who work for Messe Frankfurt and our suppliers. On the issue of fair pay, for example, we are committed to complying with all regulations set out in the long catalogue of values. And we are proud to say that, as of this year, we are also EMAS certified. So we don't just say we're going to do something – we actually have it officially verified. EMAS sets out clear goals for areas in which we must improve each year. With that in mind, we are aiming for trade fairs at the Frankfurt site to be climate neutral by 2040.

Another issue that seems to be with us for the foreseeable future is the shortage of skilled labour. How has Messe Frankfurt been affected by this?

My time at Messe Frankfurt began 16 years ago with a dual studies course in trade fair management, so I was myself a sponsored specialist. I did that at Baden-Württemberg Cooperative State University, where you can only study if you also have an employment contract. This shows that Messe Frankfurt has had a very targeted training programme for skilled workers for a long time. And that means we're still well positioned today. What's more, Messe Frankfurt is also a very fair and attractive employer.

The areas where we really do have a problem with a shortage of specialists are things like parking attendants, cloakroom attendants, gate staff, cleaning staff, stand security, catering – all the positions where lots of people are needed at short notice to keep the exhibition grounds running. To give you a rough idea, on the final build night of a Light + Building, we need around 1000 cleaners and carpet-layers until the fair opens at 9 the next morning. Just for that one day, to lay the carpets, do the cleaning and so on. Finding those people in such numbers, those are the challenges that we're currently facing.

Many service providers end up travelling a long way to do this, because we're unable to find any locally. Furthermore, the airport in the Rhine-Main region has similar staff requirements. That makes it all the more difficult. One thing that certainly does help is that we pay well above minimum wage and well above the average. But the short-term nature of the work, in which we sometimes also need chefs, those are the major challenges.

Do you also recruit from outside Germany?

Yes, we also look outside Germany. One example: we had a large gala event in the banqueting hall and we really needed a gala dinner to be served. Surf and turf for at least 1500 people. We needed at least 170 chefs for that evening and had to fly in extra people from Switzerland. We also work with extremely large subcontractors who are able to draw on a large network. But when we can't find people, for whatever reason, then it gets difficult. And that's something that both the exhibitors and the visitors notice in terms of the quality of the event. So we really have to stay on top of it.

Mr Möller, to finish, let's look again to the future. As we know, the next Light + Building is never far away. Is there any chance you can reveal the motto for Light + Building 2026?

No, I can't do that yet. We are now about a month and a half past the fair, and yesterday we had our big meeting to analyse the results of the market research. The market research consists of a very detailed survey of each exhibitor, as well as an exhibitor visitor survey. We then go back to the strategy circle and then the advisory committee to figure out first of all: what are the takeaways and where do we need to go from here. And I believe that we'll have the new motto ready in September or October, and then going into November we'll move on to the registration mailing for the 2026 event.

So there's no motto yet, but how would you very briefly recommend Light + Building 2026 to someone who has never visited the trade fair before?

When it comes to lighting and building technology, Light + Building is the one-stop-shop for users and manufactures to discover the innovations presented by all relevant market participants. So it really is the best time investment if you want to be active in the industry or sector. Come to the fair, be inspired, get involved in the trade fair activities – and maybe find some things that you weren't even looking for!

Many thanks for the interesting conversation!