Throughout the week 18, 197 visitors passed through the doors of the Melbourne Exhibition Centre to see firsthand what the 220 exhibitors had to offer. Hadley says this year’s show highlighted a number of mergers and acquisitions since the previous event, and also demonstrated significant growth in the digital market rather than wide format.

Hadley says that it’s important for stakeholders to instil confidence in the industry however some companies, whose stands were without a press, failed to portray that self assurance.

He says, “If we are encouraging the market to invest in the industry then we should be doing the same. Time will tell if exhibiters’ precautions will affect their sales because PacPrint is something you live on for 12 months afterwards and the people who didn’t exhibit may have done themselves more harm than good.”

Hadley adds, “People come to PacPrint to see things moving and get a reaction to the equipment first hand, you have to ask yourself will people attend to see nothing just to have a coffee and a chat?”

Despite lower numbers, the show has taken its place as the major and most relevant industry event for the Asia Pacific region, according to Hadley. He adds that the next PacPrint in four years time will need to focus on marketing in order to get more people to the show.

He says, “I can’t see the next show getting much bigger, it will probably have a similar amount of exhibitors with a strong focus on the harmony between digital and offset.”

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