Confex 2011 Open your minds and they will fill it.

When preparing for the day to visit a huge trade show such as Confex 2011 whose slogan this year is “ Open your mind & we’ll fill it”, it is good to start with the most important meal of the day – breakfast.


Breakfast meetings are not usually my bag but when the invite came from De Vere Venues to meet up before going onto Earls Court to Confex I accepted their hospitality.

The meeting was held in the Steam, Bake and Grill restaurant at their West One centre in Portland Place.









As you can see the team at West One put on a great spread. Click for DeVere Hotels – Resorts-Venues

The West One site has 15 rooms catering for group sizes of 2 to 250 people. De Vere knows its stuff. I have used them for years great venues and staff who know their onions – and their breakfast !
As well as their network of great venues, Account Director Philip Booth tells me DeVere are also increasingly establishing partnerships with the likes of the Ricoh centre at Coventry, and other sites across the country. The conference world is constantly changing and developing it seems.










To get us the exhibition at London’s Earls Court we hopped on a red Route master bus built in 1961 and still going strong despite ( having gone round the clock 9999 X 2 at least a couple of times in its life according to our conductor Dave (right)). Our bus was RML which was slightly longer than most route master in that it is 30ft with an extra little central window as well as addition emergency windows for those who are avid bus spotters.

John our driver ( left) for the journey took us through central London round Hyde park Corner, Knightsbridge and the new one way system at south Kensingtom to get us Earls Court arriving before 10 o’clock opening time.
Click for the London Bus Company

Relaxed and ready for a great day compared to many who had to fight to get to the venue via the rush hour crowded tube 9 underground).

The Conference posters have a cartoon reminiscent of Terry Gilliams’ collage stop animations for Monty Python’s Flying Circus. I was waiting at the entrance of a band playing Liberty Bell.

Registration number at the ready the registration was a breeze and now I am into the show.
First I need to orientate myself. There are three zones on the map location, something special and logistics.

Confex 2010 achieved a 2% increase in visitor attendance, with 10,896 visitors and 14,109 total attendance. It looks busy this year as well.

Today is the second of three days of Confex 2011. Once more unto the breech dear friends….