Conventa Week

The last week of August marked by the return of south-east Europe meetings industry trade show Conventa and the Conventa Crossover conference. Organisers had moved Conventa 2021 back from January to August and both events were half the size of the pre-crisis period and shaped up as hybrid events. Nevertheless, organisers report 77 exhibitors, 113 international and 33 Slovenian hosted buyers conducted more than 2.000 business meetings over the two-day show. Both events, they said, were proof that large business events could be safely executed even in times of great uncertainty. Conventa 2021 had kicked off 23 August with familiarisation trips to Ljubljana, Bled and Styria. The visits continued after the event, when guests visited Istria, Kranjska Gora, Portorož, Zagreb and Salzburg. Hosted buyers met the exhibitors for the first time at the welcome reception in Grand Hotel Union and the programme continued with One2One meetings throughout the event. The exhibitors, most of them from hotels, convention centres and bureaus, came from 13 countries of the region. One of the highlights of Conventa Week was the Conventa Best Event Awards. Attendees were able to support their favourite event agency by joining the live voting session and contributing 20% to the final score. The grand finale, where the winner was chosen, took place on 27 August 2021 in the Švicarija Creative Centre in Ljubljana’s Tivoli Park. Organisers closed off the week with the Conventa Crossover conference.