Is the Olma taking place?
The Corona crisis is tearing a hole in the trade fair calendar. Olma Messen therefore intends to decide at a meeting of the Board of Directors on June 5 whether the flagship event, Olma, will have to be cancelled this year.
Never in the almost eighty-year history of the fair has the holding of Olma had to be called into question. A cancellation of Olma would not only be a drastic decision for Olma Messen St.Gallen, but also a painful loss of its "fifth season" for Eastern Switzerland. For this reason, Olma Messen St.Gallen still hopes to be able to hold Olma as planned from October 8 to 18, 2020.
Empty Olma halls
The St.Gallen exhibition halls have been empty for two months, and a large proportion of the employees remain at home on short-time working.
The success of the eleven-day Olma, which is visited by more than 350,000 people every year, lives to a significant extent from the experience and folk festival character, the sociability and conviviality. Olma Messen St.Gallen is aware that the responsibility towards exhibitors and visitors is great and that concerns have increased among the organizations and individuals involved.
The Federal Council's decision to ban large events with more than 1000 people until the end of August leaves the situation for October still open. For this reason, Olma Messen St.Gallen intends to closely monitor developments in the coming weeks and gather further findings before the Board of Directors decides on the staging of this year's Olma at its meeting on June 5 at the latest, in order to give all partners, exhibitors, special show organizers and suppliers involved planning security.
Adapt preparations accordingly
In the meantime, a committee of the Board of Directors will make further clarifications, assessing current developments. At the same time, until the decision of the Board of Directors, Olma preparations will be adjusted in such a way that as few commitments as possible have to be made, and exhibitors and partners will be asked to wait before placing orders. In this way, it can be ensured that the expenses incurred on all sides in the event of a possible cancellation of Olma are as small as possible.
With well over 300,000 visitors, the Olma Swiss Exhibition for Agriculture and Food is the most visited and most popular public exhibition in Switzerland.
