MICE | Franchisors call for more business matching sessions

With a broad range of franchisors expecting the annual Macau Franchise Expo (MFE) to be a platform to expand their business in the region, some newcomers suggested that the fair did not live up to its full potential.
This year’s expo maintained a similar size of exhibitors with 165 brands from 11 countries and regions as far as the Middle East and Europe. According to the Macau Trade and Investment Promotion Institute (IPIM), the three-day event – which concluded on Sunday at the Venetian Macao – attracted over 14,500 visits of trade visitors and organized over 1,000 business-matching sessions that saw 12 contracts signed on site.
One of the featured exhibitors, Japan’s Oita Prefectural Government, organized a delegation of seven suppliers with over thirty tourism, agricultural and sideline products. However, the delegation found the turnover of visitors, especially corporate buyers, did not meet expectations.
“We want to come here to open a new market in Macau, but it’s a little bit disappointing because there were few people attending this franchise expo. But we were still able to make some appointments with hotels and food companies in Macau and other countries,” Mr Masanori Hirakawa, vice director of the Oita Prefectural Government’s Commerce and Service Promotion Division, told the Times yesterday, during the expo’s final days.
Although the booths were well patronized by individual guests, Mr Hirakawa suggested “more business talks” between original suppliers and local hotels, supermarkets and department stores to improve the overall experience.
“I checked the website of FME, it says about 20,000 visitors come to this franchise event, but I’m not sure such a number of visitors did come to this event. (…) We want to make contracts with these companies in Macau, that’s why we want to meet their buyers,” he indicated, adding that only two hotels have approached the exhibitors.
On the other side of the exhibition hall, the manager of a set of booths displaying traditional Chinese paintings told the Times “they [were] greatly disappointed as not many visitors came to the booths or to the expo.”
“We brought two top Chinese painters who won awards in national exhibitions, but they didn’t receive much interest here; in three days we didn’t sell a single painting,” said Mr Fu Fengcai from Fujian Province, stressing that these artistic collectibles had received warm responses in European expos.
Nevertheless, some exhibitors were satisfied with the results as they recognized the MFE’s platform role. “We didn’t realize that Macau could host such an international fair until we came here,” said Mr Tiger Wu, vice president of Taiwan’s Sun Spark Co., who came hoping to explore local franchisees of a franchised café brand. “Our exhibitors not only contacted local guests but guests from the mainland and even countries like Malaysia and Italy. We thank the organizer for this chance and the event was well-
organized,” he concluded.
A British consultancy brokerage called H2F also told the Times that the long-haul trip to Macau, where they searched for local clients and partners, was worthwhile. “The show’s quite small but we have some good results. Visitors may be a little bit low, but the quality’s good; you also have international visitors,” said Mr Rod Hindmarsh, adding that he was satisfied with coming into contact with local and other exhibitors from Asia.
The veteran consultant suggested that Macau’s small businesses could potentially take on a wider audience, particularly the popular bakery products. “Something that’s so unique to China could be suddenly unique to the rest of the world,” he stressed.