MATTEX

By Lynne Richardson

I love Sydney. I lived there for a couple of years, so know it well. Mind you, that was nearly 18 years ago and the place has changed considerably since then. Sydneysiders have built themselves a warren of tunnels under the harbour and CBD, a stupendous bridge on the city centre’s western fringe, and had themselves an Olympic Games since I left, and it was to the site of the games that I ventured in April for MATEX, Australia’s warehousing and materials handling exhibition.

I went with high expectations, and certainly as the train meandered its way out through Sydney’s western suburbs and the roller-coaster-like arches of the former Olympic stadium appeared, I was looking forward eagerly to a day spent rubbing shoulders with the best of Australia’s materials handling suppliers.

The first disappointment occurred as I stepped off the train – I had no idea where to go. Anyone that’s visited the Olympic Park will tell you that it is immense. It’s now under the direction of the Sydney Olympic Park Authority which is responsible for managing and developing the 640-hectare site – with of course Stadium Australia as its centerpiece – and several of the event halls have been turned into the Sydney Showgrounds and Exhibition Centre. It was to Hall 4, the site for MATEX, that I was eventually directed by a party of school children no less!

The Olympic Park is serviced by its own branch line for the train, with a dedicated service every 30 minutes from the Sydney Central station (every 10 minutes when there’s a big event on). There’s also a bus station and umpteen carparks, so you’d think there would be no excuse for visitors galore to attend the show, yet the place felt like a ghost town as I strolled along to the exhibition centre. Finally, an enormous Hyster forklift holding aloft a giant globe announced I’d finally found my way to the right place.

Collective sighs

To say I saw the whole show in less than an hour would be an understatement. I walked the whole floor twice, then again, and said hello to most of the exhibitors, and it still wasn’t morning tea time. So I tried again and this time I found Jason Whitaker, my Australian equivalent. Jason is the editor of the bimonthly [itals] Supply Chain Review [/itals], published by PSA Media (a division of ACP Magazines) and it was interesting to compare formats, styles, current trends and potential storylines.

Just down the aisle from Jason was the team from LXE Australia and a face familiar to anyone that has worked with Les Wootton and the Interlogic team. Darren Henderson was ‘on loan’ to their Australian counterparts to help promote the company’s range of rugged mobile computers which are popular within the cold storage industry.

In another direction, I found Ann Hofmans from the popular industry portal Forkliftaction.com. Ann and her offsider had possibly the best ‘toy’ available at the show: a remote-control model forklift. I so wanted one! “They steer, weave and lift like the real thing!” according to the marketing blurb. I couldn’t persuade Ann to let me bring one home, but she assured me that they are for sale via their website.

There were plenty of real forklifts and their suppliers in attendance, as you would expect from a materials handling expo, with the usual familiar brands – Toyota, Hyster, Combilift, Yale, Heli and so on, plus a few that are unfamiliar to New Zealand: Hubtex and Hytsu being two. I found it very interesting to compare the approach of the sales teams to that of their New Zealand counterparts, and in some cases it was as if they’d been to the same school of marketing! But with the distinct lack of visitors, the sales teams had very little to do – you could practically hear the collective sighs of the exhibitors from across the hall.

[SUBHEAD] The uninteractive theatre

Perhaps the biggest disappointment though was the interactive theatre, which was very uninteractive – in fact there wasn’t a single demonstration on the whole day I was there. It simply seemed to serve as a parking space for a few assorted forklifts. Occasionally someone got in and drove one around for a few minutes – perhaps having a test drive, or simply relieving the monotony – but there was no commentary, no conveyors, no pallets or cartons being racked or labelled.

When I asked what its purpose was, I was assured that the finals of the forklift drivers’ competition would be held there – but not until Thursday, which was the day I flew home. Bugger! (See below.)

An aspect of MATEX that did appear to go well was away in one corner of the exhibition hall, which was cordoned off with partitions. The Supply Chain and Logistics Association of Australia (SCLAA) used this space to good effect to run their two-day conference, and a number of high-profile industry leaders were scheduled to make presentations. Delegates were free to pick and choose the presentations they attended, and certainly helped to swell the numbers of visitors attending MATEX in general.

Why was MATEX so poorly attended? I spoke to many of the exhibitors and without exception they said they were disappointed with the turnout (visitor numbers were estimated at just over 1000 over the three days of the show). Many thought there are now too many materials handling shows in Australia. In addition to MATEX, there’s Safety in Action and Melbourne Materials Handling (also in April), the Queensland Safety Show and Queensland Materials Handling (June) and the Safety Show and Sydney Materials Handling (October). These safety shows attract enormous numbers of visitors, and happen every year!

Certainly, the new show organiser, ETF (Exhibitions and Trade Fairs), which bought the show earlier this year, has its work cut out to make MATEX a success next year. Mind you, ETF is no slouch – it is one of Australia’s premier exhibition organisers, specialising in both trade and consumer exhibitions, and runs the highly successful AUSPACK and the Australian International Motor Show amongst others. It will need to call on all its marketing acumen to pull MATEX out of this slump.

MATEX two hours after opening – where are all the visitors?

The Great Fork-Off!

The finals of the SCLAA ‘Fork-Off’ Competition were held on the last day of MATEX and proved to be very popular with the competitors, their employers, the SCLAA membership and the competition’s sponsors, according to the event organisers. Eight finalists competed on the day and all demonstrated good knowledge and coordination skills in forklift operation.

The champion male driver was Trevor Webb from the Sydney Markets, who completed the complex course in a record time of eight minutes with the lowest score of 52 points. Trevor had already done a full day’s work at the Sydney Markets previously before competing in the final. The champion female driver was Angela Mulloy who flew in from Brisbane that morning to complete the course in 12 minutes with the best female score of 116 points. Angela works with Pacific Brands in Brisbane and is considered to be one of their top operators.

A perfect score for the competition was zero points. Every time a finalist made an error, points were added to the score. The winners received a trophy, a certificate and A$1500 in prize money.

This is the first time a national forklift competition has been held by the SCLAA. The last one was held by the SCLAA’s predecessor, LMA, approximately eight years ago. The SCLAA will host the next championship in Melbourne in 2009.

Mr Bill Pflegger, managing director for Hyster Equipment, said that they were proud to support the event as they had supported similar competitions in Europe in the past. Hyster provided the battery-powered counterbalance forklifts for the competition and presented the trophies to the winners and the finalists.

Angela Mulloy and Trevor Webb (in the high-vis jackets) being presented with their trophies by Bill Pflegger from Hyster Equipment