Celebrating its 40th edition this year, HostMilano is already able to boast some impressive statistics. A staggering 150,968 professionals from 172 countries are set to fill the show’s 14 pavilions between 20-24 October 2017, while 2,010 exhibitors from more than 47 countries and every continent, will attend.
So, what are the expectations of those exhibitors and why do they choose to launch their products at HostMilano? We spoke with a selection of them to find out.
High-quality solutions
“For Alliance Laundry Systems, the world leader in commercial laundry, HostMilano it very important to help customers around the globe find success through high-quality laundry solutions,” says Véronique Simonis, international PR manager and show specialist, Alliance.
“We have bet on HostMilano because it is the most important event in the Hotel, restaurant and café (Horeca) sector, probably worldwide. HostMilano 2017 is the best window to present our new products & services to the market and share it closely with our partners,” says Mikel Olarte, marketing director of Fagor Industrial.
For Regine Oehler of Meiko Maschinenbau GmbH & Co. KG in Offenburg, Germany, exhibtions such as Host Milano are “very important possibilities for us to meet our customers and partners from all over the world. HostMilano is, for us, a perfect platform for networking and exchange.”
Graham Veal, vice president, marketing, Welbilt EMEA, agrees. “HostMilano represents the best of the foodservice equipment industry in Europe, if not the world. As the world’s global leader in professional foodservice equipment and systems, it’s an important venue for us – every two years – to showcase our full equipment portfolio, as well as our FitKitchen and Kitchen Care capabilities. It’s a unique opportunity for us to present our new corporate identity – Welbilt – and the new look and feel of our individual brands, since the re-branding in May 2017. The exhibition attracts a large number of foodservice consultants, as well as operators,both chains and independents. Very few other events provide us such a platform – to engage with designers and specifiers at the same time as discussing food trends and menu ideation with individual operators,” he says.
Markus Karlsson, managing director, Dietatec Oy sees HostMilano as “the absolute leading HoReCa exhibition in Europe and nearby regions. Host is the place to meet customers from near and far. Here you can keep yourself updated on the latest trends of our industry and meet other professionals,” he says.
Marco Ferroni, managing director, Lainox Ali Spa believes Host has now become “a red-letter date on the foodservice equipment landscape. For Lainox, as for all the other companies in the Group, it is an opportunity to meet all the market players, such as consultants, importers, dealers, key accounts and opinion leaders, making it an excellent opportunity to launch new products as well,” he says.
New product launches
The show also offers a great opportunity for brands to shpwcase their latest innovation and launch new products. “Alliance Laundry Systems will display multiple products and services for the laundry business. A range of variety of Primus and UniMac machines addressing the latest market trends and challenges will be demonstrated on our booth,” says Simonis. “We are looking forward to meeting visitors and customers and showing our UniMac, Excello wet cleaning process, saving approximately 50% of capital expenditure, 30% energy and 10% overall operating costs.”
Fagor Industrial will also display their new KORE Generation, acompletely renewed 900 series cooking line. “KORE 900 is the result of more than 50 years of knowledge and experience in the world of the restaurant trade, which began with ‘cooking’ taking centre stage,” says Olarte.
“We continue with our clear strategy of aligning our Refrigeration Line offer with the ECO Labelling European Norm, extending the usage of hydrocarbon coolants and achieving A-class energy rating is most of our refrigerators and freezers. Within this strategy to protect the environment we will present as well our newly developed blast chiller using the environment friendly R-290 coolant. We will also do the first worldwide presentation of the Fagor Dishwashing – ECO series: an innovative approach to the industry based on a gas heated dishwashing solution. Using our new gas booster heater, we can achieve incredible savings of 65% in the utility bill of our customers. Finally, in the commercial laundry sector, Milan will be the window to present our new Professional Range: introducing our new Professional Washers & Dryers that will open the doors to entirely new market segments, including multi-housing, kindergartens, universities and small hotels, with a real innovative solution,” he says.
Meiko will launch M-iClean H – an innovation-packed platform at the heart of a hood type machine – at HostMilan. “M-iClean H offers a whole host of new features, including a hood that opens and closes automatically, a drying table, stainless steel pipework, waste water heat recovery, and a mechanism designed to stop heat escaping from the machine,” says Oehler.
“We take very seriously our responsibility as a pioneer and innovator in the Industry,” says Welbilt’s Veal. “HostMilano is more than an exhibition for us. It’s a ‘meeting place’ for the most influential designers, manufacturers and operators to assemble, to share ideas and talk ‘next generation kitchens. We like to think of it as a large ‘think tank’ in which we have a leading role to play.”
Expanding portfolios
At the show. Welbilt will showcase its speed cooking brand Merrychef, which continues to expand its portfolio, having recently added a marine specification with the eikon e2s marine– ideally suited to the rapidly expanding Ocean Cruise and River Cruise segment. Other products in display include the Frymaster FilterQuick with its built-in Oil Quality Sensor (OQS) and Garland Master Series Xpress Grill [an Innovation Finalist at this week’s GulfHost in Dubai] and Multiplex, Welbilt’s beverage brand, will launch The ALBI 4, which has the capability of dispensing both carbonated and still (cordial) beverages. Garland will showcase the very latest in counter-top Induction grills, woks and griddles – a new look and feel to Welbilt’s product line, each powered by INDUCS RTTCS® technology, while Convotherm will demonstrate an innovative, new series of live-cooking ‘masterclasses’ in steaming, braising and baking. “Be sure to drop-by for a mouth-watering display of à la carte cookery,” recommends Veal.
“We are proud to present several interesting products and new features such as our mixing bratt pan called BRATTER and our innovative Dieta MI-MX kettles, which represent the latest technology on the professional kitchen market. HostMilano is definitely the right place to launch this new innovations, because of the worldwide range of customers,” says Dietatec’s Karlsson.
The Lainox booth meanwhile, will be packed with new products and new services, says Ferroni. “We will launch the new Naboo Reloaded: a significant update to our flagship product which was launched at Host two years ago. Host will also be the occasion to launch a brand-new product: Sapiens Reloaded. Lainox has attempted to reinvent the past with this product, aiming to offer our customers a cutting-edge oven, but with the ease-of-use of manual ovens with knob controls that they used in the past. The Lainox R&D team took the space and ergonomics of kitchens into account as well. Indeed, the new 171 model will be premiered at HostMilano. This is a unique oven with two separate cooking chambers and lots of flexibility for users.”
Lainox will also launch Nabook: a new revolutionary free service for chefs worldwide. “Nabook will become a virtual assistant to all chefs because any chef with Nabook can create their own recipes, create menus, calculate food costs and use it to buy ingredients: an authentic kitchen management system. And if the chef also has a Naboo in his kitchen, then they can transfer all this information to their own device with one simple click, says Ferroni.
Show highlights
With so much to see and visit at HostMilano there is a lot to look forward to for attendees and exhibitors. “I am most looking forward to enhancing the pride of belonging to the Fagor family. Showing to the market our strength as one of the leading manufacturers for the foodservice and commercial laundry sectors and sharing all this with our partners – our distributors who are the very core of this big family that is Fagor,” says Olarte.
“We want to say a big ‘hello’ to all of our customers, have good exchange with them and we want to have a look at the trends and check our opportunities for our business,” says Meiko’s Oehler.
Wilbilt’s Veal is looking forward to the opportunity “to showcase the full portfolio of Welbilt products and services in Europe, hosting a number of FCSI consultants from Asia that are travelling to HostMilano for the first time, meeting with our major channel partners (distributors and dealers) across the globe, sharing perspectives and ideas that will help us grow as a company and generating a large number of sales leads,” he says.
“We are expecting busy days and interesting conversations on our stand,” says Dietatec’s Markus Karlsson. “It is a pleasure to meet and discuss with other HoReCa professionals and to build up new relations.”
Marco Ferroni of Lainox is also looking forward to catching up with partners and showing them sometthing new. “We expect to generate enthusiasm and surprise in our partners once again with the technological innovations that we will be presenting during the show. The fair will also be an opportunity to provide our consultants and final customers with some in-depth knowledge because inside the Naboo Arena of the Lainox stand [pad 7 stand F29 H30] every hour we will produce an à la carte, banquet or QSR menu, using our technology in a kitchen measuring just 2 m2. A first-hand demonstration of how to make the most of space. We look forward to seeing you there.”
Michael Jones
