Since last week’s announcement that the 2009 edition of Gardner Publications Inc.’s MoldMaking Expo (MME) show and conference will co-locate with NPE2009, we’ve wondered what people in the moldmaking community thought of the decision.

Melissa Kline Skavlem, Gardner’s Director of Marketing, kindly obliged with this report from last week’s Moldmaking Expo 2008, where the co-location was announced:

“Our exhibitors are excited about the prospect of having a “moldmaking central” at well-established, global show like NPE2009. They recognize that together NPE and MME will pull in more molders, moldmakers and OEMs then they’ve typically had access to. But at the same time, they are comforted that Gardner and SPI will work hard to maintain MME’s unique indentity. Our exhibitors told us it was important that this show be clearly identified as MME at NPE, and not just some booths melded in with a much larger show. They are also happy that we are maintaining our conference program, because that draws the type of influential attendee that historically has made MME successful. On the metalworking side, we’re hearing that MME at NPE will expose them to a lot of new faces that might not be familiar with the solutions they provide. Not just injection moldmakers, but people who make tools for blow molding, thermoforming and other processes like extrusion dies. More OEMs too. The fact that we have some prime real estate at the brand-new McCormick West building is also exciting to them.

We’ve also had some positive feedback from would-be attendees. One moldmaker told us that next year he would have had to decide whether to go to NPE or MME, because he didn’t have the time or budget to do both. Now he can do both–at the same time. Another moldmaker told us it’s very difficult for him to let his people leave the office for a few days to attend a show, and we’ve simplified things for him with a co-location that will allow them to see everything they need in one place.”

While attending the conference portion of MME 2009 will involve a separate payment, people registered to attend the MME trade show will have free access to NPE2009 exhibits—and vice versa. So it really does mean two shows for the price of one.

If your mother was like mine and believed that a daily spoonful of castor oil was a sure way to keep your insides fully functioning, you may not have fond memories of the stuff. But don’t tell that to NPE2009 exhibitor BASF, whose new Ultramid^® BALANCE polyamide derives in part from Ricinus communis—that’s right, you botanists, the castor oil plant. Castor oil is also a feedstock for Lupranol^® BALANCE 50 polyol from BASF’s Elastogran subsidiary. The accompanying photo for Ultramid BALANCE pretty much sums up the situation and is in a way symbolic of the NPE2009 show itself, since bioplastics will be everywhere at the event—at standard exhibit booths, in a special emerging technology pavilion, and in who knows how many conference presentations. I did a rough survey of exhibitors who signed on at the Drawing for Exhibit Space in February and found suppliers of bio-based monomers and polymers, colorants and other additives especially formulated for use with bioresins, semi-finished products like films and foams, and machinery and tooling that have been re-engineered to process the new plastics. Talk about “back to nature.”

That NPE2009 team has taken the show on the road—exhibiting at K last Fall, at Plastimagen in Mexico last week, and now this week at Chinaplas.  Doing the honors in Shanghai are SPI VP of trade shows Gene Sanders and Neil Pratt, trade counsel and senior director for international trade. During Chinaplas, Gene will hold a press conference about the many innovations coming up at NPE2009. The event will be bilingual, with an interpreter providing Chinese translation.  One of the points to be made to the Chinese industry press is that China is now a major participant at NPE, having sent the largest contingent of international exhibitors to NPE 2006.  And on Wednesday, the day before Chinaplas opens, Neil will represent SPI at a one-day China-U.S. Plastics Industry Trade Summit, co-organized by SPI, the China Plastics Processing Industry Association (CPPIA), the China Plastic Machinery Industry Association, the Shanghai Society of the Plastics Industry, and Adsale Exhibition Services Ltd.

Latin Americans could make up the largest contingent of international visitors to NPE2009—larger even than Canadians. No wonder SPI president Bill Carteaux and vice president of marketing and communications Tracy Cullen are in Mexico this week for the Plastimagen show. In fact, SPI is not only having an NPE2009 exhibit booth there (Booth 51) but also serving as an official sponsor of Plastimagen 2008.

“We’ve promoted NPE2009 at other Latin American shows,” Tracy Cullen says, “and Mexico has always been the home country of by far the largest group of Latin American visitors to NPE. So—aside from the fact that Mexico is a great place to visit—it makes good sense for us to participate in Plastimagen.”

Good sense indeed. Of the 4,300 Latin American registrants for NPE 2006, nearly 2,200 were from Mexico.

SPI is hoping for an even better showing in 2009. To help matters along they will be spreading the word to potential visitors from Mexico and elsewhere in the region to apply early for their U.S. entry visas. The interviews at U.S. consular offices take little time—it’s the lead-time for appointments that can take many weeks or months. There is information available online in English and in Spanish and Portuguese at U.S. embassy websites, including the embassy in Mexico.

The numbers are in for the NPE2009 Drawing for Exhibit Space, and the numbers look very good. Representatives of 864 companies selected space amounting to 82% of the grand total taken by show-time at the previous edition of the triennial NPE show in 2006.

Participants (the photo shows some of them) contracted for 775,400 sq.ft (72,037 sq.m), which is 81.7% of the at-show total of 949,500 sq.ft. (88,210 sq.m.) taken by 1,850 companies for NPE 2006.

As always, the number of exhibitors signed on at the Drawing is much smaller than the total number at the show itself. So it looks like NPE2009 is off to a very good start.

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The Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) has a special exhibit at the NPE2009 Space Draw, and SPE executive director Susan Oderwald was on hand to tell exhibitor representatives about the advantages that will accrue to exhibitors from having ANTEC 2009 co-located with NPE2009. I invited her to contribute some remarks to that effect, and here they are:

It’s great to see the reaction of people to the announcement that the Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) will be holding its Annual Technical Conference - ANTEC - at NPE2009.  Here at the NPE2009 Space Draw, the idea of taking the industry’s two greatest events in North America and putting them together at NPE in 2009 is creating a lot of buzz on the floor about how to maximize the opportunity that ANTEC offers exhibitors.  Exhibiting companies need to think about what technologies and innovations they will be launching and promoting at NPE It’s great to see the reaction of people to the announcement that the Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) will be holding its Annual Technical Conference - ANTEC - at NPE in 2009.  The idea of taking the industry’s two greatest events in North America, and putting them together at NPE in 2009 is creating a lot of buzz on the floor about how to maximize the opportunity that ANTEC offers exhibitors.  Exhibiting companies need to think about what technologies and innovations they will be launching and promoting at NPE in 2009, and be sure to utilize the ANTEC technical conference as part of their promotional activities.  ANTEC papers are submitted and peer-reviewed for technical accuracy and content.  Papers are scheduled into sessions around various technology or industry segments – e.g., injection molding or automotive, etc.  Companies will need to submit abstracts and papers in the fall 2008 to get on the schedule for ANTEC at NPE in 2009.  Papers are a great way to highlight the finer technical attributes of a new product, material, equipment advancement, etc.  The audience at these sessions will be engineers, technical personnel and other folks who are directly involved in the technical specifications for purchasing decisions in their companies.  It’s a great audience that companies often do not get ready access to, and bringing this group to NPE will be a great marriage of technical and commercial interests.  In addition to using ANTEC to promote technical advances, it is likewise a great opportunity to learn about advances and cutting-edge research in your field.  There is no question that holding ANTEC at NPE will create depth of educational programming at NPE that is unparalleled, and really will set this show apart in terms of new technologies and innovations.  SPE’s Booth and ANTEC will all be located in the new West Hall.  In conjunction with SPI’s plans to put new technology pavilions and other special activities in the new West Hall, the expectation is that this gorgeous space will become the nerve center for technology and innovation at NPE.    

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