Marmomac 2017: 68,000 Through the Gates

VERONA, Italy – Marmomac 2017 brought 68,000 attendees to the international stone trade event, according to the show’s producer.

Click photo to enlarge“We’re talking about 1,650 companies attracting 68,000 operators from 147 countries,” said Maurizio Danese, president of Veronafiere. “This edition also achieved the objective of expanding business for natural-stone companies that concluded important contracts and signed orders for materials and technologiesalike.”

The four-day event from Sept. 27-30 also retained its global following, with more than 60% of attendees and exhibiting countries coming from outside Italy’s borders.

“In particular, there was growing interest among African countries, as well as even more buyers from North and South America and consolidated attendance from Europe,” said Giovanni Mantovani, Veronafiere CEO/Director General. “At the same time, growth was seen for Asia with China and India, followed by Russia, where the market is recovering at last, Turkey and Iran posting significant improvements.”

There were also many official institutional visits, including those by the Indian business delegation led by India’s Ambassador to Italy, Reenat Sandhu, and the Brazilian group accompanied by the Governor of Espírito Santo State, PauloHartung.

Marmomac, as a b2b promotion platform, plays a large role for Italian stone industry products, which garners almost 75% of its revenues from exports. In 2015, the Italian government included the exhibition in its Special Made in Italy Promotion Plan; on this year’s opening day at Marmomac, the Undersecretary of the Ministry of Economic Development, Ivan Scalfarotto, renewed the commitment to extend the funding made available also in 2018.

The Italian Stone Theatre, a pavilion developed with the Ministry for Economic Development MISE, ICE- Agency and Confindustria Marmomacchine, highlighted the interaction between natural stone, design experimentation and technology, while the International Stone Summit, the main stone associations worldwide focused on future developments in the sector.

2017 also welcomed the debut for collaboration with the Milan Design Film Festival – with a series of short films by international directors dedicated to the world of marble and natural stone.

The 53rd edition of Marmomac is scheduled at VeronaFiere on Sept. 26-29, 2018.

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