CONTACT:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Dianna Bisswurm
ISSA Director of Industry Outreach
diannab@issa.com
800-225-4772 (North America) or 847-982-0800
ISSA/INTERCLEAN Latin America 2008 Draws Top-Notch Crowd
Lincolnwood, IL, USA—Standing-room-only seminars and a busy show floor marked a successful ISSA/INTERCLEAN® Latin America 2008, held March 5-7 in Mexico City, Mexico. A strong focus on sustainability—including an address by the Mexican minister of environmental affairs—was highly successful in drawing top decision-makers from around the region.
“ISSA/INTERCLEAN Latin America was excellent—I commend the organizing team for listening clearly and stepping up to the plate,” said Mickey Gubman, general manager-Latin America and the Caribbean for Tennant Co., which sponsored three environmentally focused general sessions. “The flow of visitors was very good and the buyer types were what we were looking for.”
Edgar Cristiani, a representative of Cleanomatic Guatemala, came away with a similarly positive impression of the show. “It’s very important to have the availability of this information and exchange of industry techniques because it allows us to keep in contact with other Latin American countries,” he said. “And most importantly, it also allows us to tackle and analyze the problems we’re confronted with in the industry.”
The event—the largest tradeshow of its kind for the Latin American cleaning and maintenance industry—was hosted by ISSA, the worldwide cleaning industry association, and tradeshow partner Amsterdam RAI at the Centro Banamex Convention Complex.
Strong Educational Conference
“Our increased focus on hot topics, such as sustainability, supervision, and quality control, encouraged attendees to return multiple days at a higher rate than in previous years,” said ISSA Executive Director John Garfinkel. “We are very pleased that our goal to create increased business value not only paid off for attendees, but also provided this added benefit for the many satisfied exhibitors who made key contacts during the event.”
This year featured an expanded educational conference of 12 sessions. Each of the show’s three days, a sustainable or “green” general session hosted packed rooms of attendees and featured speakers from multiple countries discussing industry standards, governmental initiatives, and their operational implications.
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“We were really somewhat surprised at the high interest shown in green cleaning,” said Jaime Herrera, who, together with ISSA Director of Legislative Affairs Bill Balek, led the Green Practices in our Industry seminar.
Attendance
The draw of pertinent educational topics also was evident in the mix of attendees visiting this year’s event. More than a third were building service contractors, up 63 percent from 2006, while in-house decision-makers were up 11 percent.
“This market continues to become more sophisticated and hungry for new innovation, especially in regard to environmental issues, and that is drawing more qualified facility service providers to visit ISSA/INTERCLEAN than in past years,” said ISSA Director of Mexico Services Felix Villaseñor. “We also are happy to see our work with many facility management-related associations continue to attract more key decision-makers.”
More than a third of attendees also came from the hospitality and health care industries. Alliances represented include: the Mexico Green Building Council (Consejo Mexicano de Edificacion Sustentable), the National Chamber for the Laundry Industry (Cámara Nacional de la Industria de Lavanderias), the National Hotel and Motel Association (Asociación Mexicana de Hoteles y Moteles), the National Association for BSCs (Asociación Nacional de Empresas de Limpieza), and the ESDAI School for Institution Management of the Universidad Panamericana.
There also was a diverse international mix in Mexico City, with participants hailing from 26 countries across South and Central America as well as from Europe, the Middle East, and Pacific Asia.
Tradeshow Floor
Attendees welcomed the opportunity to experience, firsthand, products that included everything from microfiber mops to green chemicals. New this year was a centrally located area where exhibitors could provide live demonstrations telecast throughout the show and registration areas.
Attendee surveys indicated good show-satisfaction rates, and exhibitors expressed a high level of satisfaction with the quality of the show attendees. Ninety percent of exhibitors reported generating new business due to contacts made at ISSA/INTERCLEAN.
In the words of Nestor Muñiz of Naranjos Supply, “We thought we were going to find a niche for the Latin American industry, and to our surprise we found more than that, including new contacts, instruction materials, and excellent products.”
About ISSA/INTERCLEAN
ISSA and its tradeshow partner, Amsterdam RAI, produce ISSA/INTERCLEAN shows around the world, with an annual event each year in the United States. For more information on the U.S. show, visit www.issa.com/show.
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Other ISSA/INTERCLEAN shows are held in Amsterdam, Netherlands; Warsaw, Poland; Mexico City, Mexico; and Shanghai, China.
Upcoming ISSA/INTERCLEAN Events:
ISSA/INTERCLEAN Amsterdam: May 6-9, 2008, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
ISSA/INTERCLEAN North America: September 8-11, 2008, Las Vegas, NV.
ISSA/INTERCLEAN China: November 4-6, Macau, China.
About ISSA
As the leading trade association for the cleaning industry worldwide, ISSA’s membership includes more than 5,500 distributor, manufacturer, manufacturer representative, building service contractor, in-house service provider, and associated service members. ISSA offers the industry’s largest cleaning shows in conjunction with Amsterdam RAI under the brand name ISSA/INTERCLEAN, the popular Web site www.issa.com, educational products, industry standards, periodicals, and legislative and regulatory services that specifically focus on the professional cleaning industry.
The association is headquartered in Lincolnwood, IL, USA, with regional offices in Amsterdam, Netherlands; Monterrey, Mexico; Singapore; and Shanghai, China. ISSA also works with more than 75 associations, alliances, and government agencies around the world to represent the cleaning industry. For more information, visit www.issa.com.