Visit Marketplace

The Significance of International Trade Fairs

Sep 4, 2024

In a world where digital interactions often overshadow face-to-face engagements, international trade fairs stand out as critical touchpoints for businesses. These events are far more than mere showcases; they are dynamic environments where companies can build relationships, gain market insights, and elevate their brand presence. Trade fairs provide unique opportunities for businesses to connect with potential clients, reconnect with existing partners, and gather valuable feedback that can drive future strategies.

Why Trade Fairs Matter

Trade fairs, especially international trade fairs offer a rare chance for direct, face-to-face interactions with people from all over the world. This personal connection is invaluable for creating trust and rapport, which can be challenging to achieve through digital communications alone. During the trade fairs companies can discuss their products and services in-depth, address client concerns immediately, and compellingly present their offerings. For many businesses, these interactions lead to forming new partnerships and reinforcing existing ones.

Many companies who would like to have a stand in these international trade fairs start planning very early on. Fairs become a meeting point for them to sustain their relationship with their customers. They strategically allocate their budget and are willing to travel across the globe to forge and strengthen business relationships.

Standing Out in a Digital World

In an increasingly digital marketplace, standing out is crucial. Trade fairs provide a platform for companies to showcase their products and services to a diverse audience, including potential clients, industry peers, and media representatives. This visibility is essential for brand recognition and awareness. We believe that in every trade fair, CheMondis gets to be visible and meet customers.

One of the most significant benefits of trade fairs is the opportunity to gather direct feedback from customers and industry experts. This real-time input can be instrumental in understanding market trends, customer preferences, and pain points. Companies can gather valuable insights that inform product development, marketing strategies, and overall business approaches by engaging with fellow trade fair attendees.

International trade fairs often attract a global audience, making them an ideal venue for companies looking to expand their international presence. For businesses like CheMondis, participating in international trade fairs means reaching potential clients and partners from various regions. Overcoming the limitations of digital-only interactions, and reinforcing our global footprint.

Business-to-Business Dynamics

The business-to-business (B2B) international trade fairs allow you to understand the importance of visibility among other companies. International trade fairs allow companies to broaden their perspectives and reach to broader audiences.

Visibility plays an important role for companies like CheMondis, as we operate as a online market it holds great importance. Therefore, businesses are showing their full potential and getting ready for trade fairs months before events.

CheMondis’ Experience at Trade Fairs

CheMondis, a leading player in the industry, recently participated in two highly influential trade fairs: In-Cosmetics in Paris (April) and Chem Spec in Düsseldorf (June). According to Jose Alvarez, Business Development Manager at CheMondis, these international trade fairs are pivotal experiences for several reasons:

1. Maximizing Visibility: For CheMondis, the In-Cosmetics Trade Fair offered a prime opportunity to enhance their brand’s visibility. The physical presence at such a prominent event allowed the company to stand out amidst a crowded marketplace. Despite the prevalence of digital platforms, the face-to-face engagement provided by the trade fair proved to be invaluable for boosting brand recognition and awareness.

2. Effective Networking: Networking is at the heart of international trade fairs. CheMondis leveraged this opportunity to connect with potential customers and industry peers, expanding their professional network. The event also allowed us to reconnect with existing contacts and partners, strengthening these relationships and exploring new collaborative opportunities.

3. Insightful Feedback: Attending international trade fairs provided CheMondis with direct feedback from attendees, offering a clear understanding of market sentiment and customer challenges. This feedback is crucial for refining the company’s offerings and adjusting its strategies to better align with market needs. The insights gained at the trade fair will play a significant role in shaping CheMondis’ future initiatives.

4. Strengthening International Presence: International trade fairs serve as global hubs for industries, and CheMondis’ participation underscored our commitment to international markets. By showcasing our capabilities on a global stage, CheMondis was able to demonstrate its value to a broader audience. Thus, transcending the limitations of purely digital interactions.

The Outcomes and Impacts of International Trade Fairs

The outcomes of our participation in the trade fairs were multifaceted and significantly beneficial for CheMondis. First and foremost, the visibility gained through these events greatly enhanced our brand presence. Presenting our products and services directly to a targeted audience allowed us to boost brand awareness.

Additionally, the trade fairs provided an invaluable opportunity to strengthen relationships. We were able to rekindle old partnerships while also forging new ones, as the face-to-face interactions facilitated deeper connections

Our participation in international trade fairs expanded CheMondis’ global reach, allowing us to showcase our capabilities to a diverse, international audience and further solidify our position in the global market. Overall, these trade fairs were instrumental in driving our business success on multiple fronts.

In summary, the international trade fairs continue to be a vital component of business strategy, offering unparalleled opportunities for relationship-building, brand enhancement, and market insight. CheMondis’ experience at the In-Cosmetics and Chem Spec Trade Fair highlights the enduring value of these events in a digital world, demonstrating how face-to-face interactions can drive business success and growth. As companies navigate the complexities of the modern marketplace, the significance of trade fairs remains a powerful tool for achieving long-term success.

Digitalization in the Chemical Industry – Statista Survey 2019

Nov 20, 2019


This week we released our first study about the current state of digitalization in the chemical industry, with an outlook on where the industry expects it to go over the next years. The survey was prepared in close cooperation with the German statistics institute of Statista, which also helped in collecting responses.

In the survey the respondents, who work for chemical companies, were asked ten questions referring to the following topics:

  • The overall impact of digitalization on day-to-day working routines
  • Critical challenges for the chemical industry in the future
  • How prepared is the chemical industry for digitalization
  • The ratio of digitally made business transactions in the chemical industry
  • Digital sales or procurement channels and reasons for using them

The Impact of Digitalization on Day-To-Day Sales and Procurement Routines

The survey asked respondents if they believe that digitalization will influence their personal work in the future. The large majority, accounting for 84%, believe that their personal work will be influenced by digitalization in the future.

When asked, how strongly digitalization is impacting the respondents’ personal day-to-day working routines in sales or procurement already today, also more than half see their working routines, strongly or very strongly, influenced by digitalization.

Looking at the results, our respondents are prepared for this share to grow over the next years.


How Prepared is the Chemical Industry for Digitalization?

When we asked respondents from the industry about how prepared the industry is today for the age of digitalization, less than half of those surveyed believe that the chemical industry is well prepared today. Surprisingly, when being asked about the company which they personally work for, 57% consider their own company well prepared.

This is an interesting gap which will need to be watched in the future. It shows how companies are starting to get ready and advance in all different fields of digitalization and seem to feel a small step ahead of the competition with that.


CheMondis and Other Marketplaces and Platforms in the Chemical Industry

As the biggest and fastest growing chemical marketplace in Europe, we asked respondents about their awareness of digital sales channels in general and brands in particular.

We asked which sales and procurement channels the respondents’ companies are using today or are planning to use in the future. And we are excited about their answers. More than half (56%) are either using or planning to use B2B platforms or marketplaces, just like CheMondis. In the survey, this even beats the usage of both general and industry-specific search engines and shows how the business-oriented approach of platforms will become even more important in the future.

Next, we asked respondents about which platforms or marketplaces they have used in the past already. Almost half of the respondents have either regularly used or tried out CheMondis. This is a result, which makes us proud! Molbase.com was tried by 16% of the respondents. About a fourth has already made experiences with chembid.com, an industry-specific search engine from Germany.


The Reasons Behind Using Digital Channels in Sales and Procurement

Chemical companies do not use digital channels just for the sake of being digital, but have concrete, often financial, incentives to do so. When being asked about the reasons to move towards digital channels three answers stood out. Companies are looking to increase sales, at lower operational cost and want to use digital channels to deepen their knowledge and understanding of their existing and potential new customers.


A personal note

We as CheMondis are excited. The results show how the industry is on the move towards finding and using digital sales and procurement channels. Their major objective is generating new sales (on the supply side), while improving operational efficiency. Also, the usage of digital channels can help to better understand the individual customers’ and well as the market’s needs.

We share the believe that digital platforms for the industry such as CheMondis can help tremendously in creating deeper understanding of the market and even opening up new markets. As CheMondis we cover the entire value chain, from matchmaking to transactional services.

Buyers can find new suppliers, suppliers can broaden their market reach and both have absolute transparency over all quotes, orders and contracts (including the current status of call-offs). This helps companies to increase efficiency even when in their own company not all processes are digital yet.

If you are curious about B2B platforms and CheMondis now, we invite you to take a look at www.chemondis.com. If you come check us out, come again next week as we are launching our new website!

Now it is up to you

Are you interested in the full study results? Get them for free here. Do you have the same view as our respondents? What do you think about the status of digitalization in your industry? Leave us a comment below.

Thank you for taking the time to read the CheMondis Blog.