Moneo writes: The future of optical trade shows

Recently I saw a survey of its customers carried out by one of the country’s leading optical companies. The purpose of this survey was to see whether it was considered sensible to have a presence at any of the leading trade shows this year.

Traditionally these shows were gung-ho affairs where every leading manufacturing company would have a large presence. In the 1980s it could even have been agreed that the size of the stand and the novelty of the attractions on the stand could be considered as a measure of the company’s success. Of course those were the 80s when expense budgets seemed to be almost bottomless. This made for shows that were highly successful and were great social occasions where people would meet to catch up on each other. Old students would reunite to see what they had been up to in the previous year and generally they were grand occasions with practically every player in the optical marketplace in attendance.