Tendence 2015: It’s all about colours, creativity and high quality goods

If you’re dreaming of Christmas at the end of the summer, the best place to go to satisfy your cravings is the Tendence consumer-goods fair, held at the end of summer every year from 1996 in Frankfurt’s worldwide Messe. When I went this year I felt like a child when I entered a hall filled with Christmas decorations.

And of course if you are in the custom goods business as a seller or producer, the Tencence trade fair is the best place for you to be during the last days of summer.

Christmas 2015 is set to feature traditional figures with angels and their ilk, Christmas trees and creatures of the forest; from deer, owls and squirrels to hedgehogs. In terms of colour, white is on trend with silver close on its heels.

Giving is a big part of the Tendence trade fair, but not only. The latest lifestyle products and trends offered this year by 1,106 exhibitors from 48 countries can be found within the vast exhibition halls, spread out over 95,000 m2 of space. This year Tendence enjoyed 29,000 visitors from 86 countries during the four-day trade fair.

The basic colour for the upcoming Cristmas season is white. Photo by Tendence's press office. 

The proportion of international buyers remained unchanged from previous years, at 20 percent. The top 10 visitor nations were Germany, Switzerland, Austria, France, Italy, China, The Netherlands, Belgium, Poland and Spain. Exhibitors said they were pleased with the large number of orders placed.

Despite difficult economic circumstances, we can draw a positive conclusion: that this year’s fair has been characterised by top quality on the exhibitors’ side and a high propensity to order. Tendence is and remains Germany’s most important order venue in the second half of the year”, said Detlef Braun, Member of the Board of Management of Messe Frankfurt GmbH.

White Christmas at Tendence 2015. Photo by Messe's press office. 

Everyone knows how difficult is to choose the perfect gift, but it’s even harder for the gift industry to grab the attention of buyers and customers. There are three main ways to do this: creativity and colours and of course the standard of high quality.

Literature calendar

Some exhibitors showed an inspirational experience this season.

Tät-tat GmbH is a Switzerland-based company that produces a lot of small, pleasant, often handmade things to brighten up your daily life, but this season they managed to take an innovative look at a very traditional item – the advent calendar.

The handmade version of the Tät-tat Literature calendar was a list of paper that hangs on a window. Each small window contained a wax disc that accumulated day by day, allowing users to build a ‘wish candle’ for Christmas Eve, as well as small pieces of a collectible 24-page story from writers the company collaborated with.

The head of company Benedikt Martig-Imhof demonstrates how the Literature Calendar works. Photo by Natalia Amaglobeli/Agenda.ge.

"Each small window has double paper of two different colours, so the space changes after you remove the first layer to take a gift from there,” said the head of company Benedikt Martig-Imhof who works hand-in-hand with social institutions together with his wife Brigitta, which they’ve done for the past 21 years.

The "something out of nothing” products generated 200 to 300 jobs in Switzerland and around 100 in Germany.

This is ART AT WORK

When you see the stand of German company Koziol, the first words that come to mind are creativity and design. Art At Work was the instant slogan for the company and the idea behind the success of Koziol.

All of its goods were produced exclusively in Germany. The company, which has been operating for 99 years, sold 60 percent of its goods in over 50 countries and the quality of items was very high – but the main key to its success was playing with colours and shapes.

And I agree. It is much more pleasant to cut and serve your food on a board which calls you ‘princess’ or ‘boss’ or reminds you about love; if it is a gift with sense.

Colours and creativity - this comes first to your mind at the stand of Koziel. Photo by N.Amaglobeli/Agenda.ge.

This year two Koziol products – the Sahsa knife series and the Surf organizer – were awarded the renowned design prize FORM 2015 and honored at Tendence.

The Koziol prize awarded products: Sahsa knives (on the left) and Surf organizers (on the right). Photo by Koziel's press office. 

Head of the company Stephan Koziol said as well as white, which remained a basic colour for kitchen items, a variety of colours for each collection could vary up to ten. The colour strategy was very important for the company and it was a serious topic to study the main colour trends each season.

This serious approach helped Koziol to succeed even in the hard times when according to the German study ‘Town, Country and the Retail Trade, 2020’, almost one in ten retail outlets in Germany was threatened by closure over the coming years.

Stephan Koziol, who is also the chairman of the European Lifestyle Association, explained: 

The standard on both the exhibitor and visitor sides has risen. Although fewer visitors may have passed through the turnstiles, the most important people came. From the sector’s point of view, it is a fact that the number of retailers is in decline. I believe, however, that the majority of exhibitors are surprised just how good business has been at this year’s Tendence.”