Michael Reinhold

Tradeshows are an essential instrument in the marketing of goods and services. Thus, the fair and tradeshow business has become a multi-billion dollar industry, in which trade fair organizers earn the biggest share of sales with exhibitors, paying fees for exhibition services. In order to increase service quality on trade shows, trade fair organizers strive for achieving a high level of exhibitor satisfaction. Despite its major importance for the fair and tradeshow industry, instruments to poll exhibitors satisfaction remain very basic. This research focuses on exhibitor satisfaction in a business-to-business context. The paper contributes to the field of trade show research by (1) exploring relevant issues of exhibitor satisfaction, (2) developing a measurement approach, (3) collecting data from a number of 362 exhibitors in business-to-business trade shows and 404 exhibitors in business-to-consumer fairs, and finally (4) omparing results upon the Vavra's importance grid.

Trade shows (i.e., business-to-business exhibitions) and public fairs (i.e., business-to-consumer exhibitions) are an essential instrument in the marketing of goods and services. They provide vendors with a focused platform for communication and exchange with customers of different kinds (cf. Kirchgeorg 2005). The fair and trade show business itself has become an international multi-billion dollar industry (cf. Hansen 2004), in which organizers of trade shows and consumer fairs earn the biggest share of sales with exhibitors, who are paying fees for exhibition services. Like other services, trade shows and consumer fairs exhibit intangible elements and a high degree of customer integration as co-producer of perceived service quality at the point of service (cf. Parasuraman et al. 1988). Thus, public fair and trade show managers strive for high levels of exhibitor (and visitor) satisfaction in order to foster desired attitude and behavior among exhibiting companies (like, e.g., intention to buy, positive word of mouth and purchase or repurchase behavior cf. Keaveney 1995) which are positively related to financial performance (e.g., Anderson et al. 1994). The measurement and evaluation of customer satisfaction (i.e., exhibitors’ and visitors’ satisfaction) are therefore key success factors for managers of public fairs and trade shows, who need to decide how to deploy their limited resources to achieve high levels of satisfaction.