Bigger, better patronised, more international – Reifen 2012 host releases latest stats

The organiser of Reifen 2012 has confirmed that this year will indeed be a record breaker: Messe Essen confirms that in excess of 630 exhibitors will be present when the doors are unlocked on 5 June, the inaugural day of the week-long tyre show. On this red-letter day, visitors will be able to peruse stands located on more than 64,000 square metres of exhibition space – an area that is 19 per cent larger than the floorspace of the Reifen 2010 show.

It isn’t just raw numbers that are up, either. The organiser describes the upcoming show as being “more international than ever.” Exhibitors from 44 countries will fly, drive or (possibly) canoe their way to Germany and make tracks to the Ruhr-region city of Essen. This means, says Messe Essen, that ten per cent more international specialists in the tyre, retreading, and tyre component sectors will be on hand.

This year, Reifen will once again emphasise its position as the most important information and ordering platform in its sector. Messe Essen opines that the show, which is arguably world’s premier tyre fair, will take place in “economically good outline conditions.” After a satisfactory 2011 business year that saw nearly 61 million replacement market vehicle tyres sold in the organiser’s home market, good sales are once again expected this year, according to no less an authority than Germany’s Federal Association of the Tyre Trade and the Vulcanisers’ Skilled Trade (the Bundesverband Reifenhandel und Vulkaniseur-Handwerk, or BRV). In the case of passenger car tyres, the BRV is assuming a growth rate of 2.4 per cent; the experts are counting on much steeper 12.5 per cent rise in the off-road tyre segment. The BRV also believes the European tyre label will be this year’s defining subject in the tyre trade and amongst consumers, and at Reifen 2012 the association will offer an expert conference on this topic.