Rather than visitors prowling the halls doing everything in their power to avoid eye contact with the staff manning the stands, presumably out of fear that those individuals may try to sell them something, attendees seemed intent on getting as much information out of the vendors, free of charge, of course, as was humanly possible.

There seemed to be a massive appetite among the visitors to find something new, or at least discover a fresh application for existing technology. Perhaps it was because the wide-format community has more creative energy about it, or perhaps it was because the technology is still regarded as an emerging one, but the buzz around the halls was palpable.

As was the fact that a lot of printcos attending brought customers, again apparently not with a view to shadowing them around the aisles in the hope of winning some additional work, but just to show them the possibilities of wide-format and seed new ideas (OK, and win some new work as a result).

The halls in Hamburg certainly weren’t more stacked to the gills with innovation in terms of technology than say Ipex or Drupa, but what they did have was excitement – there seemed to be a genuine feeling that somewhere there would be a something that would benefit your business or clients.

And judging by enthralled faces of some of the visitors, that’s exactly what many people found.

Darryl Danielli Editor, PrintWeek