Wine show main event

If the competition heating up in the exhibitions business is anything to go by, Western Australia’s wine industry has well and truly returned to good times.

Two wine shows are planned for next year within a month of each other, with event organisers squaring off to offer wine producers the best deal in a bid to put on the best show.

The expo tussle is between Northbridge-based Exibit Exhibitions and Publishing Pty Ltd, which swooped on an opportunity to put on a wine show after the popular Wine and Food Show was sold by CMS Events to US-owned Diversified Exhibitions earlier this year.

Diversified renamed the expo to Good Food & Wine Show, an event it runs nationally, and also shifted the event from the June long weekend to July.

The event also incorporated a more national flavour.

Exibit managing director Peter Versluis said he had noticed a gap in the market for a WA wine-only show held over a long weekend, so his team launched the WA Wines on Show, which is due to be held between May 31 and June 2 2008.

Diversified’s Good Food & Wine Show is scheduled for July 11 or 13 2008. It will host its Melbourne show from May 30-June 1.

But Exibit has hit something of a snag – it can’t stitch up a deal with the local wine industry’s peak body, the Wine Industry Association of WA, because the association has one year left on a three-year contract with the Good Food & Wine show.

WIAWA membership manager Aymee Mastaglia said the contract meant the association would exclusively endorse Diversified’s show to its members and would host a stand at the event. It is not allowed to promote or host a stand at Exibit’s WA Wines on Show.

She said the association would review its position after next year’s Good Food & Wine Show.

In the meantime, the two exhibitors are fighting it out to sign up producers, with Exibit offering free stands at the 2009 show if producers buy a stand for its inaugural 2008 event.