In October, the airside community will meet in Las Vegas for the fourth International Airport Expo. Moreover, the International Airport Equipment Manufacturers’ Association (IAEMA) will also co-host GSE Expo Worldwide. Forming the International Airport GSE Expo, it’s all set to be the biggest such event yet
The combined event will take place between 18 and 20 October at the Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino, the same venue for Airport Expo as in 2014 and preceding shows. But it will be even larger and more successful, promises Virginia Salas, the board president of IAEMA (she is also business manager, ground support equipment at USGSE supplier JBT AeroTech).
She says that the International Airport GSE Expo has just the same goal – bringing to the industry a GSE-focused event – as it did when it was first launched back in 2010, but it has just got bigger and bigger, and more and more successful. Every show has attracted greater interest, Salas observes, although the challenge to meet the requirements of the ever-growing event grows with it.
Feedback from the 2014 exhibition was again very positive, she reports, although the IAEMA board is continually looking to make improvements. Salas, for example, would like
to see just a few more international exhibitors – being held in Las Vegas, it naturally tends to attract more North American companies. There have been one or two requests for symposium and conference-type content, and IAEMA is also looking to move beyond Las Vegas for future events.
Why? Although Las Vegas has proved a great host, there are problems with holding an event here, Salas explains. For one thing, it is know
n as a ‘party town’, and some people find it difficult to get their bosses’ sign-off on a trip to Vegas. IAEM
A is looking to attract some more of the military market to the show (military maintenance engineers, for example), and they find it particularly tough to justify a visit to the city.
As a result, the IAEMA board is currently considering other venues for the expo in 2018 and beyond. Four locations were up for discussion when Salas spoke to Airside International in July.
International Airport GSE Expo
Co-hosting with GSE Expo Worldwide to form the combined International Airport GSE Expo was not a straightforward decision to make, given the size and previous success of IAEMA’s previous Airport Expos, Salas explains. The tie-up would only take place on IAEMA’s terms, she adds – including that the show would have to remain just a biennial event – held in the off-years from Europe’s huge inter airport show in Munich – sufficiently frequent for the GSE market in the US.
But the opportunity was too good to turn down. The show in October will represent the only exhibition dedicated to GSE held in 
North America over the course of 2016 and, says Salas: “Having a single GSE show located in North America… was a strong desire expressed by the entire GSE community”.
October’s expo in Vegas is going to be the biggest and best yet, Salas said. With a total of 160 exhibitors already signed up, all the exterior exhibition space (all 40,000 square feet of it) has been booked and, at the time of writing in July, precious little interior stand space (of the 17,000 square feet originally available) remained untaken. “I have been amazed at the interest shown; everyone is so eager to show their best at the show,” she adds.
