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The Consumer Goods Digital Day is a digital live conference program that will launch on Apr. 20, and will include lectures, workshops and panel discussions. Sanjay Sauldie, April 2021 keynote speaker, and numerous industry experts will discuss valuable approaches to solutions and ways out of the crisis.

Participants can register now free of charge via the ticket shop and get to know the digital platform and exchange ideas with international business partners as early as Apr. 13, 2021. Orders can be placed at any time via Nextrade.

Event Details

The Consumer Goods Digital Day is aimed at everyone who works in the consumer goods sector. In particular, all trade buyers and exhibitors at Ambiente, Christmasworld, Creativeworld and Paperworld, who had to forego their leading trade fairs this year due to the pandemic. It offers the entire consumer-goods sector a future-oriented live conference program that highlights current challenges and, above all, opportunities for the stationary trade. The aim is to provide participants with valuable information and orientation for the “new” everyday business life in and after the pandemic.

“Of course, the Consumer Goods Digital Day does not replace personal encounters at our trade fairs, but it satisfies the hunger for inspiration, business exchange and ordering opportunities at the highest level. In this way, it delivers exactly what the industry needs to move forward in these volatile times”, says Julia Uherek, group show director, consumer goods for Messe Frankfurt Exhibition GmbH. The conference program is scheduled from 10:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. (CET) and will be broadcast simultaneously in German and English.

Digital Platform

The digital platform will go live on Apr. 13, 2021. Interested parties can register, free of charge, via the ticket shop. Participants will automatically receive an email with the access data to complete online profiles, get to know the platform in advance and become familiar with the technical features.

A direct exchange among participants, via chat or video, is also possible one week before the event. During the event, questions can be asked, which the moderator Zackes Brustig will take up. At the same time, Nextrade offers the opportunity to place direct orders with more than 300 companies at any time.

Programs

The Consumer Goods Digital Day offers all participants from different time zones exciting live streamings with valuable insights and tips for daily business. The agenda includes trend and practice-oriented lectures, workshops, panel discussions and live interviews.

Program content revolves around the following questions:

• How do customers return to stationary shops and city centers after COVID?
• Which online strategies are essential?
• How can trends and the emotionalization of shops be best implemented now?
• Other speakers include Amanda Farr, Frederik Gottschling, Nikolai Gruschwitz, Boris Hedde, Gabriela Kaiser, Jaye Anna Mize, Sanjay Sauldie, Klaus Schmelzeisen, Susanne Sorg, Stefan Suchanek, Marylin Repp, Marcel Rösel, Silvia Talmon, Claus Tormöhlen, Anne Lisa Weinand and Daniel Zoll.

Sanjay Sauldie

Keynote speaker Sanjay Sauldie opens the day with a plea to actively shape the digital transformation. “Retail in city centers must put the shopping behavior of customers at the centre of all decisions and strategically embark on this journey,” said the director of the European Internet Marketing Institute EIMIA and expert on the topics of disruptive innovations and digital transformation. His lecture Retail 4.0: Digitalization and the stationary trade – friend or foe? uses practical examples to show which means companies can use to help shape the future in Retail 4.0 without becoming victims of digitalization.

Boris Hedde

In his contribution to the city center study Vitale Innenstädte 2020 (Vital City Centres 2020), Boris Hedde, managing director of the Institut für Handelsforschung Köln (IFH) (Cologne Institute for Retail Research), discusses what 58,000 city center passers-by in Germany interviewed in September 2020 think are the most important parameters for shaping city centers after the COVID crisis. His approach: “Please always act empirically and systematically at the local level. Those who want to shape the future of city centers with actionism have already lost at the starting point”.

Anne Lisa Weinand

In her lecture Corona – Managing the New Normal, Anne Lisa Weinand, head of ECC Cologne, reveals what “the new normal” looks like in the retail world on the basis of exclusive and cutting-edge consumer and marketing insights and gives practical recommendations for action. It outlines where the online journey is heading in 2021 and what stationary retailers can actually do to counter this.
“With the Corona pandemic, a tsunami is currently sweeping over the retail world that demands immediate change: change through the new way of shopping, change in the design of retail-related value creation and change in local cooperation. There cannot and will not be more of the same,” said Weinand.

Marilyn Repp

Marilyn Repp, project manager Mittelstand 4.0 Kompetenzzentrum Handel HDE, agrees with this tenor. In her opinion, the accelerated digital transformation divides the industry into trailblazers and outcasts. How participants belong to the first group is shown in her presentation Four building blocks of success: trends in retail – come to stay. Her call to the industry: “Get out of the comfort zone – into the future topics of retail.”

Silvia Talmon

Sustainability is one of the most important topics for the future. “Sustainability is no longer a niche lifestyle. The mega-trend is changing the way we think and act and ushering in a change in values. Those who rely on business as usual will fall by the wayside in the medium term,” said Silvia Talmon, executive creative director, The Retail Academy. In her lecture, she will address the question of how companies can turn the topic into a holistic business principle. To this end, she will present particularly sustainable retail concepts as well as visionaries and derive sustainable starting points for retail from them.

Marcel Rösel

Marcel Rösel, project manager of Handelsverband Hessen e.V. and handel.digital, shows in his contribution Understanding and Using Marketplaces ways to bring together local business and the sales channel “online marketplace.” He sharpens the participants’ focus on making the best possible use of the large market potential and identifying the right marketplaces for themselves. He also gives recommendations on assortment strategies, pricing and quick implementation.

Katja Heinemann

How does social commerce work? Katja Heinemann, Akademie der Deutschen Medien, offers a compact introduction to the topic, leaving no question about Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest & Co unanswered. She gives concrete tips on success factors in the planning and implementation of social commerce activities.

Jaye Anna Mize and Amanda Farr

The panel discussion “Consumer Insights: Connecting the dots between consumer needs and future products” by the renowned trend research agency from New York/USA Fashion Snoops will be the final highlight. It builds the bridge from current consumer needs to future products. Jaye Anna Mize, vice president of Home and Furnishings and Amanda Farr, home and interiors editor at Fashion Snoops, will present three important changes in consumer lifestyles: Re-wildling, Transient Lifestyles and Wellness Sanctuary.

For more information, visit www.consumergoodsdigitalday.messefrankfurt.com.