BIG TRADE FAIR.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 302, 21 December 1931, Page 5

BIG TRADE FAIR.

To be Held in London and Birmingham. ATTRACTING THE BUYERS. (Special to the “ Star.”) WELLINGTON, December 21. Mr L. A. Paish, British Trade Commissioner in New Zealand, in an interview dealing with the coming Trade Fair in England, said it would be bigger and more representative of British industry than ever before. The opening day had beeVi fixed for February 22 in London and Birmingham simultaneously. The date selected for the opening had been found most convenient for the principal buying season in a majority 6f the industries represented, and in order to attract the trade buyers from other countries who are in the habit paving their annual business visit to Europe at that time of year. In London the principal development would be a new section filling a large part of the White City, Shepherd s Bush, for the first combined display of the great textile industries of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Cotton and Silk. “ Last February for the first time,” Mr Paish remarked, “ there was a new section at the White City for the products of the cotton textile industry, while the British Artificial Silk Exhibition became to all intents and purposes part of the Fair by being held during the first week of the Fair at the Royal Albert Hall. These two exhibitions, the cotton section organised by the Lancashire cotton trade organisations and the artificial silk show were such a succe'ss that meetings were called of representatives of these and the textile industries, and it was unanimously decided to make a joint display in 1932. The joint textile section, which is being organised by a committee of which Lord Derby is president, will be representative of the cotton, woollen, and worsted, silk and artificial silk, linen, and other industries connected with textiles and clothing. The section, like the other sections of the Fair in London, will be under the control of the Department of Overseas Trade, and it will include the miscellaneous textile and clothing section which has been hold in recent years at Olympia, London, where last February there were displays by leading manufacturers of such articles as hats, corsets, smallwares, gloves, homespun tweeds, and linen goods of every kind. Dominions’ Products. “ The lighter industries other than textiles will continue to be housed at

Olympia, where also the Empire Marketing Board will have its display of the products of the British Dominions and colonies. “ New Zealand always has a magnificent section. “ The Empire section is the most prominent feature at Olympia, where it is given the place of honour, extending across the full width of the Grand Hall (the main hall) immediately at the entrance. “ The heavier industries, once again, will have their display in the mammoth permanent Fair buildings at Castle Bromwich, Birmingham, and there no less than in London important developments are promised. One of the most important, involving still further extensions of the buildings, is a new section for cycles and motor-cycles, their component parts, tyres and other rubber equipment, and ‘accessories of every kind. This section will be the first representative display in the Fair of the British cycle and-motor-cycle industry, “ Another new section at Castle Bromwich will be for quarrying and roadmaking plant, and in the organisation of this the Fair will have the cooperation of the Institute of Quarrying, which has in recent years organised an exhibition of this kind. Some of the exhibits in this section will be out-of-doors, so that practical demonstrations will be possible with the largest mechanical excavators, cranes, stone-crushers, and other machinery.” “ A New Era.” “ With prices exceptionally low there is every reason to believe that the Fair of 1932 will be a success; for although trade conditions early in 1931 were as bad generally as they had been since the war, the Fair of last February was thought by many quite impartial observers to be the beginning of a new era in its history.” The Commissioner thought that in many minor ways the overseas buyers would find the Fair of 1932 more convenient and attractive than in previous years, and it was hoped for the first time to make arrangements for civic and other forms of hospitality which were likely to appeal to the business man from abroad, whether from a British or a foreign country. A special committee has been formed to consider the practical ways and means of extending real hospitality to all who are likely to appreciate it. The advance edition of the London catalogue will again be ready, with index in nine languages, for despatch overseas six weeks before the opening of the Fair, and the Birmingham organisers have other plans for making it easy for overseas buyers to ascertain in advance what the Fair has to offer them.