Baking & Snack - July 2016 - 104

In with the

NEW

IBIE 2016 Committee aims to make this
year's event the biggest and best yet with
new, engaging features at every turn.
by Nico Roesler

The 2016 International Baking Industry Exposition (IBIE)
committee is striving to be the leading baking tradeshow
in the world by providing more entertaining, engaging and
educational experiences for everyone in the industry.
For IBIE veterans, this year's show floor may look completely different than it did just a few years ago.
There are more exhibitors, more educational opportunities, more show features, more international vendors and more networking opportunities. As of May,
there were more than 250 new, first-time exhibitors.
Exhibitors have access to more than 20,000 attendees on
an expanded 700,000-sq-ft show floor in the Las Vegas
Convention Center.
New this year, the Fresh Take Talks and Experts Bar in
the IBIE Idea LAB allow attendees to engage with industry
experts like never before. The new Idea LAB is designed to
foster out-of-the-box thinking with a state-of-the-art innovation display. And the Fresh Take Talks, TED-Talk-like
presentations, are designed to help inspire attendees. Also
added this year is a Cold Storage Pavilion sponsored by the
Global Cold Chain Alliance.
"Innovation was a buzzword this year," said Kerwin
Brown, BEMA president and CEO. "So we created spaces all over the show floor to blend in all types of innovation throughout the show."
The All-American Tailgate Party on the first day of the
show is one of the new must-attend networking events,
Mr. Brown added. New networking opportunities also
include the updated International Lounge that will feature translators and other technology to help foster
communication. Mr. Brown and IBIE have worked over

104 Baking & Snack July 2016 / www.bakingandsnack.com

the past three years to expand the international brand
of IBIE by attending trade shows all over the world and
wanted to create a "world class" experience for the many
international attendees.
The committee also knows that not all attendees are bakers. Robert Benton, senior vice-president and chief manufacturing officer, Flowers Foods, Thomasville, GA, said the
IBIE committee worked to make the show more interactive for people in every segment of the industry. He and
Michael Cornelis, IBIE chairman and vice-president, international sales, American Pan, a Bundy Baking Solution,
among others on the committee, look forward to seeing
their efforts materialize in October.
"We truly have something for every role within an organization - and we have something going on at every
corner of the show floor," Mr. Cornelis said. "There's so
much to do and so much to see. Everyone brings an incredible amount of energy to the show floor and our attendees walk away with a ton of information, tools, connections and inspiration."
IBIE's full schedule of 90 education seminars covers a
wide range of topics including retail and foodservice, business management and marketing, ingredient trends and
formulations, hands-on cake and pastry decorating, tortilla production and more. But IBIE's organizing committee,
including Mr. Benton, knows you need more than a good
speaker to draw people in.
"We want it to be educational, we want it to be interactive, and we want to create an atmosphere and format
where the bakers and engineers can actually get in front of
the people who are manufacturing the ingredients and the
equipment," Mr. Benton said.
Mr. Benton and Mr. Cornelis explained that IBIE is
leading the world trade exposition in the interactive trend.
Creating a full experience for attendees depends not only
on IBIE organizers but also exhibitors.
Mr. Benton noted much of the anticipation to see "what's
new" is people wanting to meet the exhibitors, many of
which wait for IBIE to release new products and solu-

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