Many fears that loomed over the eve of Xylexpo, the biennial international exhibition of woodworking technology and furniture industry supplies, held at the Fiera Milano-Rho expo center from Tuesday 13 to Saturday 17, May 2014, vanished into the air as soon as the gates opened. Since the first day, it was clear that the event had preserved its role of reference international exhibition in even-numbered years: the flow of international operators was sustained and further consolidated in the subsequent days; towards the end, especially on Friday 16 and Saturday 17, there was a “rally” of Italian visitors.

Although the Italian market is still facing serious difficulty, the exhibition reaffirmed its international scope and its attractiveness for the industry. After all, we are talking about an exhibition that has reached its 24th edition and, despite the difficulties of recent years, has made all the necessary efforts to be a "key reference" for exhibitors and visitors.

FIGURES

Let’s come to figures. Regular registrations by professional visitors were 15,250, up by 7.1 percent compared to 2012. Attendance from Italy increased (plus 4.6 percent) and even more from abroad (plus 8.5 percent). Across the borders, excellent results were recorded by Continental Europe, with a 12.7 percent increase of professional visitors. Solid flows from Africa (plus 16 percent) and Americas (plus 1.8 percent). On the contrary, visitors from Asia decreased, though by a small 1.5 percent.

In terms of total attendance − indicating the total amount of people entering the expo center each day − the five-day result was 44 thousand, with a 42 percent share of foreign operators.

EXHIBITORS

We remind you that Xylexpo 2014 hosted 440 exhibitors, in three halls, covering a net exhibition surface of 27 thousand square meters. There were 123 exhibitors from 27 countries, with Germany in the first place (51 companies), followed by China, Spain, Austria, Great Britain and the Czech Republic, and all the others.

Source: Xylexpo