Interview with Elena Kuptsevich, director of the portfolio of exhibitions of equipment and products for professional cleaning, sanitary, hygiene, dry-cleaning and laundry CleanExpo.

CleanExpo Moscow exhibition has become a must-attend event in the calendar of cleaning industry professionals. It has also received the status of the Best Exhibition in Russia in the category of Cleaning Services according to the results of the All-Russian exhibition rating. 

A little less than 2 months are left before the event, so I would like to know what you managed to implement from the planned in the current conditions?
We managed to fulfill almost everything and even more at least because our plans didn't include COVID and everything related to it. Therefore, everything that has been done this year can be defined as one great achievement. Among the products presented by the participants and in the business program, special attention will be paid to decontamination means and how to work with them. Now, as the biggest part of the participants have booked stands already, visitors are actively registering, exceeding last year's figures by 25%. All these factors suggest that this year is special - the need for information among the professional community is as high as ever, specialists want to know how the cleaning market has changed, what is happening among market participants, how the conditions of cooperation with customers are changing, what are their needs in a new situation ... We understand the value of this information, therefore the exhibition and the business program will reflect all relevant issues. The exhibition will be attended by world brands and major Russian manufacturers, new companies, and new trademarks, the program of business events - experts and new speakers, only topics in demand. It will not be just a traditional exhibition, but an exclusively professional environment for live communication and meetings.
 
Regional specialists from Russia and the CIS have always visited the CleanExpo exhibition. Will COVID prevent them from visiting this year's exhibition?
The share of visitors from regions has reached 40% in the last 2 years. Current online registration data shows the same level of interest from regional visitors. Leading by the number of registrations: St. Petersburg, Tatarstan, Tula, Nizhny Novgorod, Chelyabinsk, Kaluga, Samara, Yaroslavl, and Voronezh regions. Today we see the registration of specialists from 62 regions and 158 cities of Russia.
We are waiting for visitors from Kazakhstan and Belarus, thanks to the opening of air communication and the first registrations from these countries are already there.
 
Have the specialists changed the goals of visiting the exhibition due to the pandemic?
I would say they have become even more diverse. We talked with a number of specialists planning to visit the exhibition: someone is planning to renew a park of floor cleaning machines, someone is looking for suppliers of chemicals, someone wants to see what new products have appeared on the market, someone will come for the sake of getting overall industry information, talk with colleagues, some are going for good conditions, a number of specialists will come to get acquainted with the equipment and chemistry that counteracts COVID-19, and so on. But they all have one thing in common - they all come to solve their professional and business problems. The exhibition has a solution for anyone involved in the industry: for cleaning companies and facility operators, dry cleaners and laundries, for wholesale and retail trade-in equipment and materials for professional cleaning, sanitation, hygiene, dry cleaning, and laundry, for managers and specialists of specialized services of hotels, restaurants, shopping malls, industrial enterprises, business centers, cultural institutions, medical institutions and many others. Among the registered visitors we see such companies as Italclean, Lavanda, Molletta, Apetta, Kristalino, Diana, self-service laundries Wash, Stains.net, Chistoff, and many other dry cleaners and laundries. And if we talk about cleaning companies, then these are Cinderella, Chistyulya, Ronova, DAKO, OMS, ChistoGrad, Carpet Express, CITY management company, Vysotka cleaning service, and many others.
 
How do product suppliers now relate to exhibitions?
The companies marketing plans are very different: there are companies that have completely or partially stopped events and other activities for this year, some of these companies are still working remotely. Otherwise, there are those who have intensified their activities and consider any offline events as an opportunity to demonstrate their strengths, the advantages of their products to solvent customers with modern needs. Karcher is an excellent example – the company expanded its exposition and became the General Sponsor of the exhibition this year. Karcher will have a very large-scale exposition, where many new products will be presented: a compact communal machine, a high-performance sweeper for the dustiest areas, as well as a new professional cleaning tool. They will also hold a draw among visitors with a 1-month rental of the B150 scrubber as the main prize.

What will the 2020 exhibition be like? Which of the participants will we see again? Who will participate for the first time?
The exposition will be very interesting. More than 120 brands from major market players such as Karcher, LavorPro, Procter & Gamble, Vyazma machine-building plant, Mobile Cleaning, TEXKEPRO, Jupiter, Alliance, and many others will be presented. There will be many premieres and product range updates.
Astari will demonstrate a unique solution for cleaning and disinfecting floors using a new model of a scrubber drier, Mobile Cleaning will have new scrubber driers, Jupiter will show a new programmer for washer-extractors, Vyazma machine-building plant will show a whole line of equipment from washer-extractors to finishing, and Karcher with a whole host of new machines and installations.
There will be new exhibitors: disinfectants and detergents from Medlex, Intersan, and Floreal, professional lines of cleaning chemicals from Forest-clean, HRC, and AgroKhimEngineering, dirt protective coatings from Primex, and much more.
This year, we invited companies to present also means for protecting the spread of coronavirus infection within the framework of the AntiCOVID Solutions project, due to the demand for such products.
We also announced a new section "Carpet care, antisplash coatings" and as a result, at the exhibition visitors will be able to get acquainted with carpet washing equipment, chemistry, and other products for cleaning carpets, as well as dirt-protective coatings. Leading Russian industry expert Taras Dudar will hold an event for carpet cleaners.

What events deserve the special attention of visitors?
The program of CleanExpo Academy, our large-scale educational and informational project, takes into account the needs of different groups of specialists. During the sessions for top managers and technologists of cleaning companies, dry cleaners, and laundries, “hot” issues caused by the new reality will be discussed. One of the new unique sessions will be devoted to cleaning in museums, it will be attended by representatives of the largest museums, such as the State Hermitage, the State Tretyakov Gallery, the State Russian Museum, the State Museum of Fine Arts named after A.S. Pushkin, State Historical Museum and others. Among the new events, there are also separate sessions by areas of activity: for shopping centers, for cleaning transport, cleaning for food production, an event for organizing the separate waste collection in organizations. Sessions for HORECA and medical institutions will be expanded - now they will cover not only cleaning but also washing. Among the speakers are the unsurpassed experts Taras Dudar and Andrey Parfeniev. Now we are negotiating with a leading cleaning association AKFO on holding a Cleaning and Maintenance Forum. The program of events is posted on the exhibition website, registration is open. Come - it will be very interesting and useful.
 
The restrictions on holding exhibitions and congresses in Moscow and the Moscow Region have been lifted. But there are a number of mandatory sanitary requirements of Rospotrebnadzor, which must be observed by organizers and guests of events. Please name the main ones. Which of the following will be implemented by you, as organizers, and what should participants and visitors know to comply with security measures?
The safety of exhibitors and visitors is our priority, so CleanExpo Moscow will be held in compliance with all the requirements of the Russian authorities Rospotrebnadzor. Among key measures: entrance with masks and gloves, thermometry at the entrance, keeping distance, disinfection of surfaces, routing of visitors. Our company already held 4 exhibitions in September, where all the above security measures were implemented, everything went well.
We remind you that the CleanExpo Moscow exhibition will be held at Crocus Expo from November 24 to 26, 2020. To visit the exhibition and business events for free, you must get a ticket in advance on the website www.cleanexpo-moscow.ru using the promo code cleanEXPO2426.