Gulfood a boost for F&B market morale

This year’s Gulfood demonstrated that Dubai can continue to play a major role as a regional, if not worldwide, F&B hub in spite of the global economic downturn — a point many exhibitors were keen to expand on.

Appearing at the show for the third time, chair manufacturer Fenabel’s chief executive Elsa Leite says: “Dubai is still the best market; we do 40% of our business in the Middle East and most of that is through our channels in Dubai. The show seemed busier this year and there were certainly more important contacts.

“People were really interested; they didn’t just come to ask for the sake of asking — they csme to make deals,” she asserts. Fancy Food Service Equipment North American representative Paul Chi was exhibiting at the exhibition for the first time and says he liked the show because it had “enormous traffic”.

“The fact that we were doing a live show attracted people to gather around our cooking table and sample our food — and that then brought in a lot of enquiries,” says Chi.

“Dubai’s a hub that attracts people from all over the world and I gathered more than a hundred business cards at Gulfood — all very good leads,” he continues. “I think we have a very big potential market for our smokeless teppanyaki table in the Middle East.”

Chi adds that, compared to other shows, Dubai’s Gulfood offered a more diverse market. “Other shows are good, but this one provides us with a better reach into the European market,” he says.

Rastelli’s Anthony Rastelli believes the show can continue to grow in strength as long as the economic downturn doesn’t cause the region’s economies to dive too drastically.

“I think shows like this can continue to grow unless the economy has a real slump,” he says.

“It’s a world economy today, so what affects the US or the UK for example will have effect on the Middle East.”

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“We’ll ride this through — everything is reciprocal; look at the newspapers during the 1983 recession and they would be a mirror of what we’re going through today.

“The last quarter was actually the best quarter we’ve ever had; if we don’t double our business that we currently have over the next six to eight months, I would be very disappointed,” he continues.

“Gulfood for us has been outstanding and we remain are positive and upbeat going forwards.”

However EDS Design marketing manager Moin Ali Zaidi notes that the cost for loading and packing equipment into the convention centre was higher than last year.

“The charges for loading were very high,” he comments. “Last year it was high but they’ve put the prices up again this year.”

But the marketing manager adds that this year’s show was a success for his firm and despite noticing a small downturn in attendance he has already booked his stand for next year’s exhibition.

“I think that maybe there were 10% fewer people here this year, but it’s not too much,” he notes.

The show gave the design firm the opportunity to showcase its large bakery and foodservice equipment, something Zaidi says was “very important”.