Organised by MEX Exhibitions Pvt. Ltd., a national platform for gifting industry and promotional solutions, Gifts World Expo 2017 became a rendezvous for more than 250 companies bringing forth 700 brands from all over India and 23,860 business visitors. The expo provides copious opportunities to both exhibitors and visitors who came from all across the country amassing together under one roof in the form of product showcasing, unveiling new products, business networking and researching market trends.

Spread across 65,000 sq. ft., the 15th edition of the Show offered an extensive product range in creative gifting ideas and promotional solutions manufactured in various parts of the country including the ones with international collaborations through Indian representatives. Right from the buyer-seller meets & deal closures to product launches to brand promotions, the Show proved to be a serious business amalgamation not only for exhibitors, but also for attendees pouring in with their sourcing goals from different parts of the country and abroad.

As rightly pointed out by Anuj Sawhney, MD of Swiss Military Lifestyle Products Pvt. Ltd. when he insisted why this exhibition is a perfect platform for showcasing the best the Indian gifting industry has to offer. “In an ever growing gifting environment, a professionally managed show being at par with the best in the global arena is the need of the hour. It was wonderful being a part of this year's Gifts World Expo. We received a lot of appreciations for our products including watches, wallets, bags, trophies, etc., following heavy footfall at our stall good response and registered numerous queries.”

Scheduled from 22-24 July 2017, the show this year had extended its reach with two new additions – Stationery World and Custom Branding Machines. While stationery included paper products, office supplies, notebooks, diaries and many more; custom branding was aimed at value-addition in gifting options by personalizing the gifts. Both the segments received due responses from the exhibitors and visitors alike making worth their segregation for enhanced focus.

Besides these two, the Expo witnessed the latest innovations in the already existing sections of Home Décor & Hardware, Handicrafts, Timepieces & Watch, Trophex, Corporate Gifts & Premiums, and Electronic Appliances & Gadgets from various manufacturers, producers, designers and suppliers. With all these on the frontline, Gifts World Expo can be summarised as nothing short of a living resource pool that enables potential businesses collaborations.

According to industry sources, the Indian gifting market is estimated to be $30 billion wherein the gifting solutions nowadays are not just confined to corporates and festive seasons, but have been successful in broadening its horizon. Players like Deborah, Milano, Delsey, Welspun, Modways, Swiss Military, Ekaani, Baltra, Zebronics, Windsor Chocolates, Natchmann, Bingo, Portronics, Ambrane, Veira, and the likes stole the show with their best collections.

Amidst all these, there were quite a few brands which made their presence felt owing to the distinctive concepts that they came up with. For instance, ‘Pinaken’ attracted a whole lot of visitors towards its unique set of pouches and bags meant for varied but specific purposes. The showcase included canvas tote bags, card wallets, coin pouches, cosmetic bags, fabric notebooks, laptop sleeves, iPad covers, etc.

The highlight of the event was the stall of ‘Mouth & Foot Painting Artists’ which remained over-crowded all the three days for its live showcasing of the art of differently-abled people. One such artist, Bandenawaz Nadaf was demonstrating his painting skill while he was busy painting with his feet. The painter, who has been associated with the organization for as many as eight years created a few master pieces for the onlookers.

Notably, Music Cards & Caravan from Saregama India Ltd. allowed visitors to applaud with its unique nodes. The custodian of over half of all the music ever recorded in India, Saregama was marked as one of the preferred gifting solutions with commendable number of followers.

Another eye-catcher was a trendy keychain as unique gifting and branding solution from Fuzo that allows attaching with mobile device and amplify music to entertain a small group of people. It can also be used as a mobile stand for easy browsing. The sides of the keychain give ample branding space for promotional purposes.

Bingo Technologies found this platform apt to unveil its new range of fitness band by launching Bingo F1 and F2, compatible with Android and iOS operating system, and supports Bluetooth 4.0. These bands are water & dust proof, and come with a battery capacity of 70 mAh to provide a standby time of up to 300 hours. Both the bands are made with plastic ABS and TPS elastomer, touted to provide protection from UV and resistance to abrasion, sweat and sebum.

Going ahead, the concept of customised packaging from Dreamz & Dezires was well-received by the visitors, especially the theme hampers such as coffee hamper, salad & sandwich hamper, wine hamper, chocolate hamper, etc., evincing unique packaging ideas which the buyers appreciated with ‘WOW’.

Baltra Home Products found the place apt to introduce its Air Fryer, the experience is good as the company hopes to make most of the potential queries that it generated during the three days of serious business dealings.

The show also marked benchmarks for some of the exhibitors who found Gifts World Expo as the only platform to announce their entry in to the country’s gifting industry and promotional solutions. Brands like Maspar, IdeaCraft, Beauty Concepts, Ruchoks, Nut-Nut, etc. found this platform pertinent enough to mark their respective impressions in to this burgeoning gifting industry with products that they showcased and got remarkable response for.

The iconic gifting exhibition captured attention from leading corporates, wholesalers, exporters, importers, franchise seekers, interior designers, retail chains, department stores, distributors & agents, duty-free & travel retailers, event companies, gift industry professionals, government agency buyers, home & lifestyle stores, independent retailers, media, promotions & marketing agencies, supermarkets, and overseas buyers. Most of the representatives were decision makers representing various sectors such as pharma, software, FMCG, health and hospitality along with other sectors.

A big thank to ‘weprintall’ for it being our Show-title sponsor, this year. We are proud to add its logo with ours and hope that we helped it earn the mileage for imprinting it's brand in their client’s heart and mind and to help them identify a strategic approach. Interestingly, Gifts World Expo 2017 served as the launch pad for weprintall.com which is actually a web portal and would help companies source gifting products with customized branding thus making the brand marketing professionally simple and easy.

Nevertheless, with 700+ brands and 5000+ products, the expo was truly a platform known for selling out-of-the-box ideas in the Indian market, offering exclusive benefits to its visitors by showcasing world-class products, innovative gifting ideas for the first time, products in every budget range, besides facilitating direct interaction with distributors & suppliers, and opportunities to expand business contacts with focused areas on different product categories on the show floor.

The next edition of the Show is scheduled from 10 to 12 August 2018 at Pragati Maidan, in New Delhi.