Sirius Buying Group’s first trade show at its new venue of the Marshall Arena in Milton Keynes saw a significant increase in visitors over last year.
The new 3,000sq m venue on the MK Stadium site played host to around 22 suppliers to the Sirius Buying Group and the showfloor included stands from brands such as BSH, Caple, CDA, Franke, Haier, Hotpoint, Rangemaster, Symphony, Smeg and Stoves and Rangemaster, and distributors such as DAD and Swift.
The two-day event, held on Sunday, October 1 and Monday, October 2, included a trade show, member conference and gala dinner on the Sunday and the trade show on the Monday.
Speaking to kbbreview at the show, Syrius Buying Group managing director Steve Jones said he was very pleased with the new venue and attendance levels.
He said: “On the Sunday, everyone bar two people out of those who has registered to attend showed up. Attendance was up by around 20% to 25% on last year at around 65% to 70% of our membership.”
The show had previously been held at the Forest of Arden Hotel in Birmingham and Jones said they had been searching for a suitable, larger venue for some time.
“It is central and easily accessible for our members, with the amount of hotel rooms we need and has the right facilities. It is also good from a logistics point of view for manufacturer setting up and breakdown,” said Jones.
He added that he was also impressed with the quality of stands at the event. He said:
“They have done an incredible job with the quality and presentation of their stands. I am quite proud and appreciative of the support they give us. It goes to show how seriously they regard the Sirius Group and how they want to showcase their products and encourage business from our members.”
As well as giving its members a great networking opportunity to meet and discuss business with other retailers, brands had quite a few new things for them to see.
On the BSH stand, Siemens had its new iQ700 laundry models and Bosch presented the new Serie 8 with new front panel styling, touch control and iDos. It also had N90 Hide & Slide models from Neff in a new graphite finish.
Caple was showing new black steel wine cabinets and the black Ember bridge tap that offered diffusers and handles in gold, copper or black, while nearby Smeg had its new Azzurro fridge in blue, a new single-cavity 900mm range cooker and some new freestanding laundry models.
This show was also the first time that Haier, which owns Hoover and Candy, had shown the Haier product range to Sirius members. Across the hall Hotpoint was demonstrating the new Clean Protect induction hobs with a nano-coating that makes cleaning easier and helps resist scratching and chipping.
Kitchen furniture was on show from Symphony, which started trading with the buying group around 10 years ago, and of course Caple, where MD Danny Lay told kbbreview it had been dealing with Sirius for over 20 years.
On the BSH stand, UK MD Gunjan Srivastava said: “It has allowed more engagements, more relationships, more time to interact with visitors. It is a beautiful venue. We are extremely happy the show.”
Asked how business had been for the Sirius Buying Group, Jones told kbbreview: “The market has been very challenging, but overall we are where we need to be. We are optimistic for the final quarter and the past two months have been our best months of the year, with a double-digit increase over last year. I feel that we are still struggling in the cooling and refrigeration categories off the back of Covid. The built-in market has also dipped a little more than expected this year.”
Looking ahead to 2024, Jones added: “We expect it to stay similar to this year. It definitely won’t get any worse. We should start to see some growth next year and definitely into 2025.”
Speaking about the new venue, Symphony national business development manager Robert Williamson said: “It is a fantastic facility, the hotel is superb, the conference and gala dinner was amazing. And there are great facilities here for unloading. We had a fantastic day yesterday [Sunday].”
It was a good year for the group with 14 new members joining, bringing the total membership to around 200. It is also pushing ahead with its drive to bring more kitchen retailers into the group. The group is strong in appliances and Jones believes that it can offer the same benefits and savings to kitchen retailers too.
On the Symphony stand, for example, it was offering a 90% discount on seven or more Milano or Linear displays if ordered by March 31, 2024 and Franke was offering 80% off RRP on any three sinks or six taps ordered.