Title: IFA 2020 PreOpening

Story: Impressions of Entrances / Check-in / Safety-Traffic Lights / gfu-Conference

Date: 02.09.2020

Location: IFA Berlin, Germany

Duration: 17:47



Shotlist



00:00 - Several Impressions of Entrances

02:08 - Check-In

03:39 - Safety-Traffic Lights

05:33 - gfu-conference impressions

13:56 - Interview with Kai Hillebrand, Chairman of the Supervisory Board, gfu Consumer & Home Electronics GmbH

13:59 - "So what we have seen, is obviously for many month a lockdown, that we haven't had any physical events. So, what you had is a lot of presentations, innovations of products being shown on a virtual space. And you find slowly but surely people want to get back into contact with each other again, because in the end business is made between people. And on the other hand, if you look at products, if you look at innovations, you need to experience them. You need to touch and feel them. So, for us it was clear and logic the moment the senate of Berlin gave us the OK to organize this event, that we go ahead with a physical event."


14:33 - "Safety is first, safety for our visitors, for our staff. And that we had to adhere to, no question about it. So we developed a hygiene concept and that actually works around the world. So we got the acceptance from the senate to pull this through. And in the end, we have now everything set and go to host more than 1.000 people."

14:53  - "Obviously we have a special hygiene concept. It is of upmost importance, that we adhere to it. So that we can really guarantee, if people stick to the rules given, that they are not risking their health."

15:07 - "Well, in essence we expect the same as a normal IFA. But I have to say, because we do not have the product showcases, it will be different. So the Key motivation and the key expectation is actually all around our press visitors. We will have a lot of keynotes, we will have a lot of One-To-One Talks with the press. And in the end, they will be the ones, who spread out the news and innovations, who spread out the news on new products. So that in season the consumer really get a hunger for new products coming into the market."

15:34 - "Well, in the end nobody could have foreseen at the start of the pandemic what are we going to go in a downward spiral or not. And in the end it turned out, that the home electronics business actually is quite resilient. We have had for example in house-hold appliances for ten years growth. And that is for a good reason, because consumers wanted to have these products. And because of the living at home, working at home, people staying at home, actually this was even boosted. So you see many categories related to working at home, light for example, smartphones or webcams have been growing in a substantial way. But also 'eat at home' means that people bought far more refrigerators, far more food prep products than they have done in the past. So all in all we can say, our business has been flourishing under the pandemic. And we also had a quite positive outlook going forward."

16:28 -  "So looking ahead, there is no reason to believe that business will go in a tumble again. I mean, what we of course have to see is that the pandemic has different faces in the world. So if I talk about Europe at this point of time, I can really see that Christmass season is will become a success for home electronics. Where is other parts of the world are maybe lagging behind or ahead of us, where already the business has been picking up. What you see is 'working at home', 'eating at home', 'entertainment at home' is something which became embedded in the new way of working, the new way of thinking. And that means, products are needed by consumers to go through these activities at home."

17:09 - "So we absolutely believe that the IFA will be having a strong future. What we do se is, that we will have more a physical and virtual hybrid concept going ahead. We do think, that the interaction between people, the feeling, experiencing of products and innovations is of upmost importance to convey the message. So that you need the physical events, but I think we will be able to attract new consumer groups via the hybrid model, via the virtual space. So actually it will be quite challenging, it will be quite interesting going ahead. So '21 will be very much an interesting IFA."

17:47 - END