2001 Annual Report - Unibail-Rodamco

CONVENTION-EXHIBITION CENTERS
Sound strategic foundations
Growth set to accelerate in tandem with economic
globalization
Growth in international trade and market globalization
have proved steady trends of the world’s economies
for a few decades.As a result, companies in all sectors
see their market boundaries expand across Europe,
if not worldwide. A company may have to look very
far to find its customers, while competitors, opportunities
and threats are also spread across a continent
or even globally.
Many companies look at exhibitions and conventions
as a highly effective platform for reaching their
customers, as well as rivals and potential partners.
Consequently, the underlying markets for Unibail’s
convention-exhibition centers are intrinsically
buoyant. This explains why a major share of the
division’s revenues is generated by recurring events,
which account for around 80% of the exhibitions
hosted by the Group’s sites.
Implementation of one strategic
division
Unibail aims to manage, operate and market its
different convention-exhibition centers as a single
coherent entity that can meet the needs of the
various customers.
The division already benefits from solid foundations.
< Carrousel du Louvre
> Cnit-La Défense
>The hall of Cnit
At the same time, as companies grow, conventions
become an essential means of bringing together
teams that are often separated by long distances.
Non-media communication is more and more
important
All companies are now operating in an increasingly
specialised and innovative environment. As their
products and processes respond to these changes,
advertising becomes more important in order to
reach new and existing customers.
In this context, non-media communication accounts
for an increasing proportion of overall communication
and advertising budgets. As an example, the split
between media and non-media activities is now 42%
vs 58% in France and 35% vs 65% in the US.
As a matter of fact, the largest events in France are
hosted by Unibail’s sites (public shows, such as the
‘Salon de l’Agriculture’, ‘Foire de Paris’ and ‘Mondial
de l'Automobile’, and trade fairs like the ‘Batimat’
building expo, ‘Salon du Meuble’ furniture show and
‘Semaine des Technologies de l'Information’ I.T.
exhibition).
Unibail’s expansion strategy involves enhancing
the quality of the facilities and services in order to
increase value creation and attract new events maximizing
occupancy rates.
Achieving these objectives means developing new
marketing tools; implementing a proactive marketing
policy; expanding the range of services offered to
customers; forming partnerships to develop new
packages; overhauling our information systems;
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