Organisers of Aquatics Live have called on the pet trade to support the event in future as visitors to last weekend's show claimed there were not enough exhibitors.
Almost 4,500 people – an increase on last year – attended the consumer show at London Olympia, and they ranged from novice to expert. Organisers were happy that they’d fulfilled the brief from the trade to attract new hobbyists.
But Tom Spencer, of On Show Productions Ltd, said: "If there was a criticism from visitors it was there were not enough exhibitors.
"The public is hungry for the opportunity to see first-hand the latest developments in aquariums and equipment and when they come to the exhibition they do so with the intention of spending money. This has been proved two years on the trot, and especially this year when all the high-end tanks at the show were sold, some of them two or three times over.
"Aquatics Live is there to support the trade and it offers a great sales and marketing tool which wasn’t available until last year. It benefits manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers, and the trade needs to show its support by becoming more directly involved."
Exhibitors who had stands in 2011 reported greatly increased footfall in 2012 and some retailers took three times the amounts they did last year.
Axel Finken, CEO of Giesemann Lichttechnik, said: “As a first-time exhibitor at Aquatics Live, Giesemann was very pleased with both the number of people who visited our booth and with the qualifications of those visitors.
"We saw interested people from all over the UK, many of whom we might never have otherwise met. We saw a great deal of interest in our aquarium series Linea, Contura, IQ and Esprit, and our lighting products Teszla and Futura.
"Our very steady booth traffic reflected the ever-increasing demand from the aquarium community for more information on our high-quality products. Aquatics Live demonstrated again that it is the 'not to be missed' event in the calendar for the whole aquarium community in the UK.”
The aquatic seminar sessions which included talks from eight national and international celebrities were well-attended and even in the reptile sessions, where seminars are notoriously under-supported, seats were packed out for Mark Amey and John Berry.
The presence of headline marine speaker Joe Yaiullo was in doubt when the second storm hit New York and his public aquarium on Long Island was under threat, but he reshuffled his flights and arrived, jet-lagged, to present his talks.
The show dates for 2013 are the 16th and 17th November and bookings for stand space are now being taken by On Show Productions Ltd (Tel: 0207 430 2500).
Photos © 2012 MindStudio and © 2012 Brian Goldstein for Aquatics Live
