Spring Fair, the number one sourcing destination for home and gift retail, has revamped its exclusive VIP buyers programme for its 2020 show to create The Club.

 

The tiered initiative, with Platinum, Gold and Silver levels of membership, will reward Spring & Autumn Fair’s most loyal and highest spending buyers. Facilitating connections between exhibitors and the show’s best sales opportunities, the revamped programme will focus on delivering greater return on investment and time at the show, helping to make members’ experiences as efficient and rewarding as possible.

 

Platinum perks

 

The initiative’s highest tier of membership, Platinum, has been developed as part of significant new investment from show organisers Hyve Group. At Platinum level, The Club will host more than 150 UK and international buyers with the highest spending power at the show, including representatives from the likes of Aldi, Shop Disney, Alibaba Group, Historic Royal Palaces, Sainsbury’s and Liverpool FC. Helping them to deliver on return on time invested at the show will be a dedicated team of advisors who will work closely with them to develop bespoke show agendas and pre-book one-to-one meetings with exhibitors, based on their sourcing needs.

 

ISM is one of the most important international trade shows in the Sweets and Snacks industry calendar. “2020 will be Fudge Kitchen’s sixth ISM (Stand K40 4.2, ISM, Koelnswald, Cologne 2nd – 5th February 2020),” explains Fudge Kitchen MD, Sian Holt, “which is a testament to how important the show is to us. Over the years, it has given us quality leads for UK and international buyers that have significantly helped growth; and has developed our distribution networks across Europe and as far as Canada.”

 

“As we are a very person-based company,” she continues, “ISM importantly allows us to personally reconnect with our existing customers, introducing them to our products, ranges and new packaging; and helping them to hone their listings for 2020 – with Christmas always a key planning focus. And because Fudge Kitchen is defined by innovation, it is also the place for launching our new products and an indispensable window on global confectionery trends and new ingredients. I am looking forward to scouting for interesting new products, developing themes and inspiration to take back to our busy development kitchen in Kent.”

 

As part of the next phase of the industry-driven recyclable plant pot campaign, the Horticultural Trades Association (HTA) is calling for action to be taken by local authorities to collect recyclable plant pots in their kerbside collections. 

The HTA is urging member businesses to contact their local council to strongly encourage them to commit to collecting and recycling non-black plant pots. As well as providing members with a template letter, the HTA will write to the Local Government Association, the national membership body for local authorities, highlighting the issue and stressing the need for consistency on collection.

 

This follows the recent publication by recycling charity RECOUP of their 2019 ‘Household Plastics Collections Survey’ which shows that 10% of councils state that they collect plant pots as part of their household kerbside collections. This amounts to 40 councils; demonstrating an increase on previous estimates.

 

RECOUP’s ‘Plastic Packaging in Horticulture - Recyclability By Design’ report provides the technical assurance that recyclable pots are fully recyclable by local authorities. This document outlines that there is a clear demand among plastic reprocessors for non-black polypropylene, which the recyclable pots are made from and any concerns over pot contamination should not present any issues if the pots are emptied by the consumer. There is an increasing desire amongst consumers, especially gardeners, to ‘do the right thing’ and they are looking to their local councils to help them achieve this.