Preparations for spoga+gafa 2022 are in full swing. A little less than ten months before the start of next year’s event it is already becoming apparent just how significant the largest garden lifestyle trade fair is for the gardening industry. Following a successful early-bird booking period – with bookings from fifty countries and every continent, plus some considerable increases to exhibition spaces booked – the list of confirmed international exhibitors sends out a powerful message for the re-start of the trade fair in June 2022.
Looking ahead to the coming year, there will be plenty that is new at spofa+gafa. In order to meet requests from the industries involved to adapt the trade fair cycle to new ordering patterns in the retail sector, this year the trade fair will take place in June for the first time, having for decades been held in September. “The requests from customers across all trade fair segments, but particularly furniture, barbecue and decor, to extend their exhibition spaces – in some cases considerably, show that the new event date has gone down very well,” says Stefan Lohrberg, Director of spoga+gafa.
Since spoga+gafa will no longer be held in co-location with spoga horse, which will move to February from 2022, it has been possible to accommodate this increased need for exhibition space. The halls that are now free will be used by spofa+gafa exhibitors in the garden furniture segment, allowing them to benefit from a further enhanced visitor flow in the south section of the trade fair grounds. Routes between the established furniture hall, 10.2 (garden unique) and the two new furniture halls (11.1 and 11.2) will be shorter and more direct, better enabling visitors to meet their suppliers.
When the supply and demand sides of the garden lifestyle industry come together again at the Cologne trade fair grounds in June 2022, spoga+gafa’s key theme – which has been carried over into the coming year – will once again be “Sustainable Gardens”. “The pandemic in particular is proving that the needs and demands of global end customers are changing more rapidly than expected. spoga+gafa is addressing these challenges and, together with its exhibitors and visitors, is developing responses and solutions to the major issues facing the gardening industry in future,” comments Stefan Lohrberg. One of the platforms for this within the event programme will be the lecture programme, “Logistics 2.2 – Nontainer or Container?”.
In 2022, the physical trade fair in the Cologne exhibition halls will for the first time be complemented by a digital event, spofa+gafa @home, which will run in parallel. The new digital event platform will provide exhibitors and visitors with additional benefits: online and offline trade fair days that are targeted and perfectly planned in advance, additional business worldwide, and targeted networking – both during spoga+gafa and in the digital follow-up to the trade fair.
spoga+gafa 2022 will take place from 19 to 21 June. For information about confirmed exhibitors and more, please visit www.spogagafa.com.
