Since the global pandemic is still impacting our daily lives, the Retail&Brand team and Fira de Barcelona are finding a new way to reconnect all the industry actors and rebuild ecosystems to accelerate recovery. This year we are transforming ourselves with a new model of event: a one-shot, innovative edition happening digitally on November 17 - 18, 2020, putting our participants’ safety first while protecting the core of the event: Smart City Live.
The new format will consist of a full-day, broadcast television show with interviews, debates, and success stories, followed by a second day of online workshops, sessions and side events. RBEWC will organize and sponsor the retail and brand topic that will focus on the global impact of COVID-19 over the short and long term, so that we have the chance to act as the platform to reconnect and rebuild the retail ecosystem and accelerate a much-needed recovery.
Organized by Fira de Barcelona, Retail & Brand 2020 will showcase the new trends that are changing the way we sell, buy and consume in physical and online stores around the world. Concepts such as sustainability, flexibility and efficiency in the supply chain, brand trust and credibility and the generation of new experiences during the purchasing process are making firm headway. All upon a wave of technology that is having a rapid impact in all processes and revolutionizing consumer habits.
Generation change and new technologies
“We’ll display technology, solutions, business models and disruptive experiences that can help retailers and brands to adapt to this new situation by focusing their contents on the new consumer, the generational change that’s revolutionizing purchasing models”, explains Alba Batiste, director of the Retail & Brand Experience World Congress. In this regard, over three days the event will provide access to trends, knowledge, innovations, companies, experts and success stories that explain this paradigm shift in commerce and directly appeal to the consumer’s emotions. The congress expects the participation of more than 150 international speakers, who will analyse the habits of the new generations of consumers; the digital transformation, particularly the impact of technology and big data on the sector; sustainability and ethical purchasing; innovation in the supply chain; DTC (direct to consumer) brands as the new business model to reach the youngest customers. At the same time, Retail & Brand will maintain its Labs and Workshops, practical sessions for groups of retail managers on topics related to digital transformation and customer knowledge.
The commercial exhibition area is expected to attract more than a hundred exhibitors, who will provide technological retail solutions in both physical e-commerce stores, as well as digital marketing tools, data analytics, supply chain management, information technology services and others related to improving the customer experience.
Retail Startup & Innovation
The Retail Startup & Innovation space will have its own identity and be open to the participation of startups presenting their projects to professionals and investors organizing personalized meetings. This year marks the launch of the Innovation Academy, a space where professionals, companies and startups will be able to develop the new digital skills required by the current ecosystem.
Another new feature this year will be the guided itineraries around the stands at the trade fair, enabling visitors to understand the uses and functioning of the innovations on display in a didactic manner, while networking will be promoted at the highest level within the retail community, with a social agenda to encourage meetings between partners and collaborators and exchanges of contacts and information between professionals in a cordial atmosphere.
Finally, Retail & Brand 2020 will act as a trend seeker and go on “safari” around Barcelona to identify unique commercial establishments and chains breaking new ground in the application of technologies and sustainability criteria and putting new models into practice in the experience generation. Visitors to the event will be able to sign up and go on these commercial routes through the streets of the Catalan capital.
The first Retail & Brand Experience World Congress held in May 2019 attracted 106 exhibitors, 210 speakers and more than 5,000 visitors to Fira de Barcelona’s Gran Via venue. As for 2021, we will be back in Barcelona with Smart City Expo World Congress and Smart Mobility Congress. We will use the lessons learned this year to add to it and make it the best edition yet.
