Bologna exhibitors overcome scheduling clash as fair opens in positive mood

Numbers at this year’s Bologna Children’s Book Fair (BCBF) have held steady, despite the 2016 event taking place just a matter of days before the 2016 London Book Fair (LBF), which has led to logistical challenges and increased costs for some publishers who are attending both fairs.

The clash between the Bologna and London fairs has been particularly difficult for exhibitors who will use the same stand at each venue. Sharon Parker, Bonnier chief operating officer, admitted costs have “about doubled” in order to transport the publisher’s stand over to London in time for the start of LBF, on 11th April. She added: “It’s been exceptionally difficult. We have had to hire four or five special HGV vehicles that have to be ready to break our stand down [at the end of BCBF] on Thursday.”

Parker said, however, that there was never any thought of Bonnier not attending BCBF: “It’s Bologna, it’s a great fair and we are committed to it. We’re just going to have to be very careful and creative for our appointments on Thursday.”

Walker Books group sales director Caroline Muir said the schedule was “awkward” for her company. She added: “It’s unfortunate that any discussion that was had over [the fair dates] didn’t come to a conclusion most of us would have wanted. Logistically it’s hard. We had to get together a totally different consignment of books for London this year. We have a different stand configuration at LBF but we have to use bits of the Bologna stand, and there are extra costs involved in rushing those back.”

BCBF organisers have said that early indications suggest exhibitor numbers have remained steady year on year. BCBF director Roberta Chinni told The Bookseller Daily at Bologna that “it has been very difficult, but we’re very pleased that exhibitor numbers are on par” with 2015’s fair. Chinni also revealed that exhibitors in 2016 increased their square footage used year on year.

LBF has offered a service to exhibitors to “mirror” stands; building replicas of publishers’ Bologna stands in London. But one publisher, who wished to remain anonymous, said that service was “a non-starter as the costs were exorbitantly high”.

Edinburgh-based Barrington Stoke had to make decisions about staffing as there were no direct flights to Bologna from the Scottish capital. M.d. Mairi Black said: “[It meant] that one person from our team who normally comes to Bologna isn’t coming this year and will just go to LBF. Thankfully at LBF we don’t have our own stand like we do here—we are part of the Bounce stand [at LBF]—so that makes life easier.”

This year’s clash came about because BCBF had to move its preferred 2016 dates because of the early Easter holiday and also to make way for Cosmoprof Bologna (17th–21st March), the world’s biggest cosmetics trade fair. BCBF and LBF have worked together to resolve scheduling conflicts for next year, with LBF moving forward to 14th–16th March, and BCBF remaining in the first week of April (3rd–6th).

Still, some publishers saw the positive side to this year’s schedule. Tom Truong, publisher at Little Tiger, said: “Logistically, of course, getting everything back to London is a bit of a problem but everyone is excited about both fairs. The timing won’t affect the business; in fact, the fairs being so close together keeps the momentum going.”