With the ongoing Covid crisis in NSW, continuing border closures and snap lockdowns, Reed Gift Fairs and Life Instyle have had to make the difficult decision to postpone their Melbourne fairs to next year.
Originally scheduled for early August, Reed Gift Fairs Melbourne and Life Instyle Melbourne had already been moved to 17-19 September, but unfortunately holding an event at this time is just not feasible.
“2021 has been quite a roller coaster for everyone and we understand the level of planning involved to both participate and attend our events, so we know that this will be disappointing news for everyone involved, ” says Life Instyle event director, Flyn Roberts.
“The industry has been hit hard with the current forced closures for retailers and our hearts go out to those businesses, particularly in NSW right now, but also VIC and many other states. But we also know that retail is a resilient industry and we will do all we can to help support the connection between brands and retailers until we can meet face to face again.”
Reed Gift Fairs event director, Cory McCarrick, says they tried really hard to offer an event but the current situation has made it impossible.
“We were hoping the case numbers would’ve gone down by now but instead they have only gone up,” he explains.
“We surveyed both exhibitors and attendees to see if an October date would work and even though slightly more exhibitors were open to the idea, October is just not a suitable option.”
While everyone is extremely disappointed the fairs won’t go ahead this year, they are looking forward to Reed Gift Fairs Sydney and Life Instyle Sydney at the ICC from 19 to 22 February 2022, which had already seen a huge boost in demand even before the Melbourne fair was moved.
“There is huge demand for the Sydney show and we are much more confident that vaccination rates will have gone up considerably, and border closures and lockdowns will be less frequent,” says McCarrick.
“We thank all our exhibitors and retailers for their patience, positive words of encouragement and unwavering support,” adds Roberts.
“But I’d also particularly like to thank our team who have faced each challenge head on and not given up the fight until it became out of our control. Their passion for our events and community is inspiring and I know we will now move forward to brighter things in 2022.”
