Toen we op 3 februari schreven dat het Coronavirus een bedreiging vormde voor de MIDO werd dat nog niet erg serieus genomen maar vandaag heeft de beursorganisatie officieel besloten de beurs te verplaatsen naar een datum eind mei of begin juni. Een enorme ingreep die zijn gelijke in de afgelopen 50 jaar niet gehad heeft. Juist nu de MIDO het 50-jarig jubileum zou vieren en er voor aankomend weekend tal van extra evenementen gepland waren, moet de Italiaanse beurs deze ingrijpende beslissing nemen. De situatie in Noord-Italië en de angst dat veel bezoekers weg zouden blijven, laat ze echter geen andere keus. Zodra er meer nieuws is, leest u dat uiteraard op Vision-Today.
MIDO’S 50th EDITION HAS BEEN POSTPONED
Today, Saturday February 22, the Board of Directors of MIDO, the world’s leading tradeshow dedicated to eyewear, met in order to set up and define a strategic response to the CoVID-19 emergency, in relation to the upcoming edition scheduled for February 29 to March 2.
MIDO’s organizers have announced that the Board has decided to postpone the 2020 edition until dates, still to be decided, between the end of May and mid June.
“We took this decision out of respect for the current alarming situation and for our exhibitors and visitors – said Giovanni Vitaloni, President of MIDO. As this health crisis is developing in Italy, we could not but choose to postpone MIDO’s 2020 edition. We immediately defined and selected a timeframe within the year which could meet the needs of the eyewear industry at a national and international level.
We are aware that this decision will require industry professionals, exhibitors, buyers, press members, opticians and everyone working for MIDO, including our staff, to re-schedule their attendance, with a significant impact on all internal organizations.
It will be a twofold effort as we are just a week away from the show, but we cannot honestly think of celebrating our 50 years when the world – and our country now in particular – is experiencing such an international crisis.
We trust though that, for the very nature of the current situation, which is alarming and continuously evolving, our exhibitors and visitors, the media and everyone involved will understand our decision. Our sense of responsibility as business people, but most of all as human beings, towards our families, our children, our colleagues, has compelled us to do something that we would have never wanted to do, especially for this special edition, the year of our 50th birthday.”
The new dates of MIDO 2020 will be announced in the upcoming days in order to let exhibitors re-schedule their presence at the show, in compliance with possible new instruction from the relevant authorities who are dealing with this health crisis and in accordance with how the situation will develop and the availability of the spaces at Rho Fiera Milano, with which we keep constantly in touch.
