Impressions 2022
Over 50 percent increase in visitors makes the PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION a great success
From June 22 to 23, 2022, the Congress Center Süd in Düsseldorf once again became the centre of the print universe of multi-channel and dialogue marketing. The focus was on sustainable media production, programmatic print and value-added printing.
With over 1,250 participants, the fifth edition of the PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION came to a successful close. The unique concept of the congress and trade fair ensured a communicative and busy atmosphere and enabled long-awaited networking and knowledge transfer at the stands and in the presentations. The annual industry event has not only firmly established itself in the German-speaking region, many visitors also made their way to Düsseldorf from Belgium the Netherlands and Luxembourg.
"The atmosphere was excellent! Compared to the previous event, we were able to record an increase of over 50 percent in the number of participants. That's a top result," says a delighted Rüdiger Maaß, Managing Director of Fachverband Medienproduktion (f:mp. / ). "And we managed to bring the right target groups together to network for an in-depth exchange of ideas. It was a wonderfully inspiring two days – not only for us, but also for the entire industry!"
Extensive programme
Nine themed worlds, four stages, 50 top-notch speakers, 19 half-hour presentations each day and 63 international exhibitors – including DATEV, Deutsche Post, FKS, Kodak, Konica Minolta, Mondi, Xerox and HP, among others – offered participants future-oriented content on the potential of digital printing applications, multi-channel solutions, creative finishing and sustainable packaging solutions.Highlight projects show the fascination of print
Visitors were particularly interested in the seven highlight projects that f:mp. realised with its partners. These projects represent hands-on best practice and thus reflect the special unique selling point of the PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION: a "hands-on" trade show with concrete and practical application examples. The fascination of print is thus made tangible in the truest sense of the word.Next generation of Print
In order to get new and young target groups interested in print and packaging, the Media Production Association and Messe Düsseldorf, as organisers of the congress trade fair, cooperated with the Fritz-Henßler-Berufskolleg (FHBK) from Dortmund, Stuttgart Media University, the Akademie für Mode & Design (AMD) Düsseldorf and with the Berufskolleg Bachstraße from Düsseldorf. The young talents of tomorrow were able to find out directly from the experts at the stands and in the lectures about the fascinating applications of print and packaging in modern and sustainable media production."Even in the digital age, print is highly relevant and indispensable in its many facets – we want to convey this to the younger generation in particular," explains Sabine Geldermann, Project Director Print Technologies Messe Düsseldorf, and adds: "The response from students and trainees was very good. The demand for information is simply extraordinarily high! Young people want direct access to the market and want to experience live what potential print has to offer."
For this reason, the organisers are planning to further step up investment in the skilled workers of tomorrow for the next edition. For example, it is planned to offer "Youngster Talent Recruitment" for prospective trainees and interested companies. In the future, a "Start-up Area" will link established companies with young and innovative newcomers.
Exhibitor Testimonials for PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION 2022
"The PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION presented itself as the perfect marketplace for the graphic arts industry. Everyone was there: brand owners, buyers, production people, printing companies and suppliers. This advantage paid off for us in concrete terms.
We were able to demonstrate how print stores can process jobs much faster and more cost-effectively with our modern ERP/MIS system and make their work easier for their customers with integrated customer stores, web-to-print and job interfaces. These advantages of digitised business processes were reported to us by visitors. So we are now looking forward to follow-up appointments and certainly interesting projects."
"You can literally feel that there is more dynamism and movement in the industry again. The desire to network and exchange ideas has risen. This shows that the digital solution is not the only one – it's the mix that counts! I see myself as a digital print bridge builder.
The audience at the PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION was broad and thus perfectly matched DATEV's equally broad range of products and services. It was a matter close to our heart to present our trainee project "DATEV Cookbook" at the trade fair – presented by the trainees themselves. What's special about it: The entire process of creating the cookbook was implemented independently by our junior staff from A to Z."
"As a long-standing exhibitor at the PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION and a strategic partner of f:mp., we are delighted to be present again this year. For us, the trade fair is a place of encounters and it is here you notice that the industry wants to meet and exchange ideas again. We are noticing more and more in the market that print as a medium is no longer being declared dead but has arrived in the mainstream of digital marketing. As a software manufacturer, we are all the more pleased to accompany the further development of partners and customers. This is why we also joined the Programmatic Print Alliances (PPA) in January."
"The industry get-together shows once again that print is alive and how print can be experienced. We are delighted to be part of the PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION and to help shape the mix of technology, knowledge transfer and networking. For FKS, this year's event was all about Industry 4.0, because automation and networking are the be-all and end-all of efficient process design these days. We were also able to present a European premiere for our B2 solution in the area of multifinishing. We held exciting discussions on all aspects of printing, postpress and intelligent process design and thus jointly developed and took away valuable inspiration and innovative ideas."
"At this year's PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION, we were able to hold exciting personal discussions with representatives from industry, retail and brand manufacturers. We also received positive feedback from numerous visitors about the interesting presentations. Here, for example, we were able to connect very well at the sustainability presentations with the fact that all Mondi own brands such as PERGRAPHICA® or Color Copy are Cradle to Cradle Certified® Bronze. A huge compliment to the excellent organisation, which allows us to focus on our core competence: Advising customers on paper selection."
The PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION is a driver of innovation. Various companies and industries show here how the graphic arts industry will produce tomorrow. And all this in a familiar atmosphere with many and good opportunities for networking. This is why Konica Minolta has been part of the event since the very first edition. We also have a traditional and longstanding partnership with f:mp.
The PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION is something special: The focus is not on the pure sale of machines, but rather on demonstrating solutions and application possibilities. To this end, Konica Minolta has set up GLAMPRINT – a symbiosis of glamour and print. Here we can show all printing options and solutions that are possible in extended four-color printing. The focus for us is to offer the customer added value. This year, we were particularly pleased that many young students and trainees visited the trade fair.
“The PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION is an excellent opportunity to expand one’s network and find out about the latest trends and views in the print and digital industries.
The perfect organisation by f:mp. especially in the run-up to the event has made it a success. The Convention was well attended across the board and provided many opportunities and new leads. The event was also enriched by the origin of visitors coming from many different sectors.
Digital printing, custom and special inks as well as multi-channel applications for print and digital were in high demand, which fits the portfolio of Xerox and XMPie very well. Sustainability also featured in our conversations with customers and parties interested time and again; this topic is gaining more and more importance especially for younger visitors and has become a key decision-making criterion.
All in all, a well-rounded event that is constantly reinventing itself and has the chance to be successful in the future as well."
In 2021, we were also at PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION - our first presence trade show after the outbreak of the pandemic. That was really a highlight for us, because we had to make customer appointments online for a long time and then finally had face-to-face contacts again. This year it was a similar story. The first day was a bit slow until noon, but then there were a lot of interested people. So for us it's a very good platform here to present our solution in job management, process management and approval workflows to potential customers. This is a topic, a lot of things are done remotely today, we have also learned it through Corona: A lot of things have to work decentrally, you have to integrate all people into the processes and that is exactly what the software we offer can do. Collaborative work in the browser, via the browser, without large installations on the clients. Everyone can see transparently in the process where my job is, what its status is, or who has to do what. We can also automate this with our software. For example, you can make annotations to a PDF or flyer, and the system automatically passes this information on to the next person who has to approve it. And that's a topic that's coming up here, and we're also in talks with very good customers about it. So for DALIM SOFTWARE it is definitely a topic to always do this fair. We will be here every year, because every year we have a benefit from it, get to know customers and make contacts.
We are at PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION because we find the trade show well organized and streamlined. Agencies are our target group, which we try to address because they design our collateral material, which we then process into coupons or ads for customers. What we particularly like here is that as exhibitors we can network very well with other exhibitors and make contacts that help us very, very well in our day-to-day business. Rüdiger Maaß and his team have organized this trade show very, very well in our eyes. I am already looking forward to 2023.
This is our first time at PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION. In recent years, we have tended to visit the trade show passively as visitors, but now we are exhibiting for the first time. We are of course delighted to be able to participate in events and exhibit ourselves again after two years and to have the opportunity here to meet with customers and those who want to become customers, to share our expertise in presentations, to talk to other partners and to further cultivate and expand our network.
Roland Seidel: Definitely important, finally a presence again. So trade fair presence. And you can also see that yesterday was very well attended and we are actually also very satisfied with the contact establishment again and happy to show new products to customers. Just after the pandemic again go forward.
Just buy paper. Inquires. That's the most important thing for all of us here.
Ulrich Teichert: I think it's important, above all, that people continue to have confidence in paper, despite the difficult supply situation at the moment. That the digital solution alone has no future, but must continue to run in parallel - print and digital. That is very important.
We are at PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION for the first time this year. Last year we were only here as visitors. The trade show is very refreshing. You meet each other again. It's an industry meeting of all companies - software or hardware. The connection with the congress and the lectures is very optimal, the flow of visitors is good, there are good discussions and a good quality of visitors. We would definitely come again next year.
Of course, trade fairs are very important for us, because we are just launching a new product on the market and dissemination at trade fairs is essential for us, because we are not only looking for new customers, but also new partners. And of course we have a lot of partners here at the trade fairs. This means that on the one hand we have networking among the trade fair exhibitors and at the same time we also have visitors who represent potential customers. Therefore, this new business topic is really great for us at trade fairs, the face-to-face is actually very good for us, to finally see people again, without a mask. So that means everyone has a mouth, everyone has a nose. You've almost forgotten that. These are all things that we are happy about. We're actually very active now in terms of participating in other trade shows, but since we're a Düsseldorf company here, it's also the case that we naturally like to be on site at PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION. These are the reasons why we say: Finally, a trade show again!
As Tessitura GmbH, we are a start-up and were only founded in October. I am the managing director and shareholder. We belong to Heinrich Steuber, which is celebrating 100 years this year, and Steuber is naturally in the print market with this experience. They've been through umpteen drupas. For us as Tessitura, however, PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION is the first trade show and that's why we're still doing it together, just to take a look first. In general, I think it's great to just be in contact again, because since the founding of the company, we've only been able to live off video conferences and we're always out of the home office. And just talking to people here, and just saying directly when you go to the booth: "Hey, come over here, we'll show you something here" - that's something completely different. I can also convey my emotions about the product in a completely different way. That comes across directly and you notice that people say, "Hey cool, this is what you have that the market needs and I'll come right over, give you a card or send me your pitch deck." That's the difference. Now just from the attendance numbers yesterday until noon we actually didn't have a break and then that died down a little bit and today it's kind of lukewarm. But that's not bad either, because today I'm taking the time to just go directly to the booths. That's why it's a good time for us. And I'm also giving a talk later on, so it's a well-rounded event for us and the need list has filled up nicely. So from that point of view, it's what I had hoped for.
We like to exhibit in Düsseldorf at PRINT & DIGITAL CONVENTION. But we are also drupa exhibitors at the last two drupas that took place and also at the trade shows that were cancelled, we had registered and are guaranteed to be there again at the next one because the location is good, because it is close to our location in Cologne. This is where our customers come - we are quasi local here. Organization is good. Trade fairs are important. We are trade show people. I had drupa in 1990 as my first trade show. And for us, this is actually the contact with our customers and also with new customers. And that makes a big difference to our open house activities, which we had again this year, where people can come. Because our machines depend on the haptics and the visual connection. What can I do with that anyway? We just sell things that people want to see: What's the result? Trade shows actually provide the best framework for this.