Because a sour economy and security concerns have cleared out miles of aisles in the trade show business, it's unusual these days for a trade show to score big.
However, LightFair 2003 continued its impressive run, with packed booths and lots of excitement about new technologies on the trade-show floor at the Jacob Javits Center, New York, May 3-8. With over 500 exhibitors and attendance expected to top 19,000, show organizers said this was the biggest LightFair ever.
The growing number of manufacturers selling LED lighting at the show was of particular interest. A few short years ago, light-emitting diodes (LEDs) were a novelty at LightFair. But because of their extraordinary lamp life, the development of white-light LEDs for mainstream applications such as office lighting and the potential to literally blend and paint an application with a endless pallet of colors, LEDs have captured the imagination of the lighting industry. While it will be several years before LEDs can compete with traditional lighting sources on a cost basis, it's a technology worth watching.
All of the major lamp vendors are developing LEDs, and they promoted this technology in their booths at LightFair along with the latest in incandescent, halogen, compact fluorescent, T-5 fluorescent and metal-halide lighting.
In a seminar, “Lamp and ballast update,” Paula Ziegenbein, commercial engineer, Osram Sylvania, Danvers, Mass., said T-5 fluorescent lamps were taking market share from other high-intensity discharge (HID) lamps.
“Mercury vapor is declining, high-pressure sodium is flat, and metal-halide is under attack from T-5 high-output lamps,” she said.
Also notable on the show floor this year was a large contingent of manufacturers from China and Pacific Rim countries selling lighting components. In contrast to the glitzy mega-booths common at LightFair, many of the Pacific Rim suppliers exhibited their products in simple white pegboard booths. Because their target audience was primarily lighting manufacturers exhibiting at LightFair, their presence created “a show within a show,” according to several attendees. Most exhibitors are drawn to LightFair to market their wares to lighting designers, architect and other lighting professionals. LightFair 2004 will be held in Las Vegas, March 31-April 2.