Dear colleagues, dear friends, 

My last two columns here carried big UFI staff news, respectively: Chris Skeith will take over as UFI’s CEO on January 1, 2025, and Kai Hattendorf will leave UFI after a decade in the CEO’s chair (or, for a fair share of that, an airplane seat).

This month, it is my turn to move on – I am preparing to hand over the presidency to Hugh Jones in a few weeks in Cologne at our Global Congress. I will not preview my review of the year here and now – I am working on that and will report to all of you at the year UFI has had in our General Assembly there. Here, I want to connect three big issues dear to me and my year at the helm of UFI.

The first one is that our Congress in Cologne is gearing up to become one of our biggest meetings ever. And while we like to take bigger automatically for better in our industry, I am sure this parallel holds true here. This year’s Congress is pivotal for our industry, offering a unique opportunity to unite, strategise, and reimagine how we can turn today’s changes into tomorrow’s chances. Besides the content and the networking events, the Congress is THE big moment for us all every year to get together as the global UFI community. And as we will embark on UFI’s 100th year, on our association’s centennial, we will mark this occasion with one change and one legacy re-invented.

This change is my second point: For the first time, you will see UFI’s reworked and refreshed visual identity on site in Cologne. Our previous look and feel, defined and designed in 2003, has stood the test of time remarkably well. But in an increasingly digital world, how we all see, work, and interact with brands and identities has changed completely. Our new logo now connects the future of UFI with our 100-year legacy, using the green wing to bring back more clearly the connection to Hermes, the Greek God of Trade, as a 2,000-year-old symbol for the eternal history of the marketplace. The new font and framing make our logo and appearance clearer and leaner, and they strengthen our positioning as the global association of – and for – the exhibition industry. As always, changing means challenging – the path to this new logo and identity has been a journey with many members of the Executive Committee being involved. I want to thank all of them for input and challenges on the way. I am sure that, within days or weeks, this new UFI look will be as familiar to us as the previous one.

Last but not least – to legacy. I held back on my third point until the end of this column – because this is a matter close to my heart. As I have often said during my presidency, every association can only be as good as its members. UFI is blessed to have so many of you volunteering time and energy into our organisation. And I wanted to make sure that we can recognise this better. So, we will take a hint from UFI’s rich history and celebrate the return of a legacy award scheme. For the first time, we will award the “UFI Medal of Honour” in Cologne, building on the historic medal awards last celebrated in 2001. Going forward, his highest UFI recognition will be granted to up to three individuals annually for their exceptional services to the global exhibition industry and the UFI community. The respective UFI President will select recipients in consultation with the UFI trio, and those chosen will be awarded during a special ceremony at the Congress.

Please make sure you are with us in Cologne to honour your colleagues! See you there.

Yours,

Geoff Dickinson, UFI President