AMELIA ISLAND, Fla. — The Society of Independent Show Organizers (SISO) annual CEO Summit brought together hundreds of top trade show industry executives April 8-11 at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Amelia Island, Fla., for high-level education and networking.
With over 300 registered attendees, this year’s SISO CEO Summit returned to pre-pandemic levels.
“The SISO 2024 CEO Summit surpassed the level of 2019,” said Vinnie Polito, CEO of SISO. “The audience was very diverse, with many of the industry leaders you would expect to see, as well as several new leaders from the North America region and several other countries around the world.”
The event featured in-depth and candid discussions on the state of the industry, emerging trends and expectations, and forward-thinking strategy for independent trade show organizers. It also offered attendees networking opportunities during breaks, receptions, and fun activities like a golf tournament and a boat tour of the island.
Education designed for leaders
The event’s educational content was aimed at a senior-level executive audience, with conversations diving into the economic factors impacting the industry, as well as how leading organizations are approaching technology and investment in the year ahead.
“The conference program mixed many traditional themes with several areas of new content, including presentations from adjacent industries, such as the NBA,” Polito said. “It also included a SISO information desk for the first time. Content was presented in a faster-paced approach with several shorter sessions. The sponsor community was also well represented.”
The training began with a lively economic presentation by Anirban Basu, founder, president and CEO of Sage Policy Group, who explained that while economic indicators show the economy is improving and beating expectations, people are still feeling the financial pressure of inflation. Daniel Lippman, a Washington-based reporter for Politico, provided an overview of the U.S. political landscape in this election year alongside the economic report.
Ken Holsinger, Senior Vice President of Strategy at Freeman, and Kimberly Hardcastle-Geddes, President and Chief Marketing Strategist at mdg, provided insight into attendee and exhibitor expectations and trends. Their presentation highlighted commonalities between what the two groups want and where they differ.
Emerald President and CEO Hervé Sedky, RX CEO Hugh Jones, Questex CEO Paul Miller and Fast Forward Events Partner and Co-Founder Michelle Metter then took to the stage to discuss how they are acting on the findings of Freeman’s latest trends report. The industry leaders shared how they are listening to customers through social listening tools, talking to event directors about value propositions and measuring what people are engaging with to discover what they want from an event. The panel also discussed recruiting.
“This industry needs people from outside the industry to bring in new perspectives,” said Hugh Jones, CEO of RX. “When you bring in new people, you get interesting perspectives.”
Jones gave the example of a new employee from outside the industry who suggested, after speaking with customers, that booth sizes at a major construction show be limited to 320 feet, which allowed attendees to get hands-on experience with more exhibitors’ products and increased satisfaction rates at the show.
Joey Graziano, NBA senior vice president and head of global event strategy and development, shared the five elements of “high-octane” moments at events, while Lance Fensterman, CEO of Fanatics Events, Aaron Levant, founder and CEO of NTWRK and CEO of Complex NTWRK, and Deirdre Connolly, executive producer of Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen and BravoCon, shared why their organizations decided to make the leap into the event space and how they’re creating community- and fan-centric events.
Richard Harbridge, CTO of 2toLead, presented on the expected impacts of AI on the events industry and Carlotta Mast, SVP and Market Leader at Informa Markets’ New Hope Network, discussed the many ways sustainability and business intersect.
Other speakers included Greg Hitchen, CEO of Terrapinn, and Craig Fuller, CEO of Firecrown and Founder and CEO of FreightWaves, as well as Jonathon Weiner, Founder, Chairman and CEO of HLTH.
Tommy Goodwin, Vice President of the Exhibitions and Conferences Alliance, Yancy Weinrich, President of North America at CloserStill Media, Nancy Walsh, President of North America at Informa Markts and Walter Charnizon, President of TechDay HQ, also provided an update on advocacy.
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Focus on mergers and acquisitions
One of the main topics of this year’s event was M&A activity, with many sessions dedicated to activity in the sector, breaking down how a deal takes place and the strategy for organisations to grow through M&A.
Lisa Hannant, CEO of Clarion Events, sat down with Alex Roth, Group Strategy and Business Planning Director of Informa PLC, to discuss their growth strategy for Informa. By focusing on organic growth, entering adjacent markets post-pandemic, and using data collected by the events division, Informa has been able to successfully grow its business and deliver high-quality services.
“We study our mistakes carefully,” Roth said of the key lessons he learned while working at Informa. “If all our mistakes have one thing in common, it’s culture. We thought we could get the different elements of the culture to match, but we couldn’t. In most cases, the warning signs were there and, for one reason or another, we ignored them.”
Russell Wilcox, Executive Chairman of Clarion Events, spoke with Simon Foster, CEO of Arc Network Group, and Gareth Bowhill, CEO of CloserStill Media Group, about the markets they are looking at, their priorities for the coming year and what they are seeing from vendors in the sector. Bowhill explained that he is looking to invest more in North America and Southeast Asia, and Foster explained that China looks more interesting, as it is expected to boom there. All three executives agreed that there are more vendors coming to market than buyers, and therefore more thought goes into transactions.
Then, Rick McConnell, CEO of Trifecta Collective, Ryan Anderson, Partner at GreyLion, and Arnie Didier, COO of the International Mass Timber Conference, spoke to John McGovern, CEO and Owner of Grimes, McGovern and Associates, about acquiring the conference and how they grew the event with expanded expertise and resources.
A place to do business
The event also served as a meeting point for executives to conduct business with each other at a variety of networking events and activities.
“SISO is a place where deals get done. The networking seemed particularly intense and overall the energy level was incredibly high from sunrise until late in the evening each day,” Polito said.
At the Annual Report to Members, the 2024 Krakoff Industry Excellence Award was presented to Nancy Walsh for her incredible contributions to the trade show industry.
The prestigious award is named in honor of industry legend Robert L. Krakoff, who built and led some of the most successful companies in the trade show industry. In a full-circle moment, Walsh revealed that Krakoff hired her early in her career and helped launch her into the event world.
The SISO 2024 Leadership Conference will be held August 13-15 in Philadelphia.
Find full coverage of the SISO CEO Summit in an upcoming edition of Trade Show Executive. Subscribe to receive your copy here.
Contact Vinnie Polito at vincent@siso.org