Subcon show focuses on business

Procurement professionals who came to the trade show, dedicated to the manufacturing supply chain, who were there to find contract manufacturing services included representatives of leading aerospace organisations such as Meggitt and Rolls-Royce, automotive companies including GKN Driveline and Jaguar Land Rover, as well as manufacturing heavyweights Cummins, Caterpillar, Terex and Babcock International. Footfall at Subcon was 6% up year on year.

Kevin Garbutt, sourcing manager at Halifax Fan, said: “It was helpful to meet a significant number of potential suppliers face to face in one arena which is a significant timesaving to the more traditional methods of sourcing activity.”

Steve Nesbitt of Jaguar Land Rover commented: “Subcon is a useful event to meet a collection of potential supply and development partners to enable a better, more efficient future-state solution set, for component manufacturing through to complete end-user products.”

One of the new initiatives for Subcon 2016, which ran from June 7-9, was a Buyers Programme, which allowed participants to pre-plan their appointments and attend exclusive networking events.

Jude Robinson, managing director of exhibitor GWR Fasteners, said: “Through the Buyers Programme appointment scheme we had a request from a very large company to meet us and find out what our capabilities are. They were quite impressed with what we can do and this could significantly increase our turnover.”

Dean Munkley of Qimtek, which sponsored the programme, added: “We had over 200 leads in total and generated three times the cost of the show in potential business.”

Jude Robinson concluded: “The quality of visitors was excellent and we were speaking to people who were interested in both our manufacturing services and our standard fasteners. There were people there we wouldn't have seen otherwise. Some of them were companies not far away from us that hadn't heard of us and were interested in us quoting for them. Some of these leads have already come to fruition.”

Grant Burgham, business development and portfolio director for Centaur Engineering Live Events, which organises the show said: “Once again Subcon showed it is a place where real business gets done. The show delivered a focused offering for buyers and gave our exhibitors the chance to show their capabilities to senior procurement professionals that they would not otherwise get the chance to meet.”

Subcon will be back at the NEC in 2017 from June 6 to 8 when it will also run alongside The Advanced Manufacturing Show and The Engineer Design and Innovation Show.

Subcon www.subconshow.co.uk