As a historic hub for global trade, the vibrant and cosmopolitan city of Amsterdam was the perfect location for Intermodal Europe 2023, Europe’s leading container shipping event. With over 6,000 attendees from more than 80 countries, Intermodal is THE place to network, do business and shape the future of maritime transport.
Introducing Carrier Transicold
Carrier Transicold is a leader in container refrigeration. Being industry giants, their presence at Intermodal Amsterdam was expected and needed to be impressive. Carrier Transicold’s exhibitions are led by Sharmaine Teo, senior manager for communications and marketing. As a veteran exhibitor, Carrier Transicold had clear objectives for Intermodal Europe – to generate brand awareness and facilitate networking. Their booth also needed to support their leadership position and appear suitably confident.
The challenges of implementing exhibitions across continents
Operating a worldwide business has many challenges, and ensuring a professional presence at high-profile exhibitions is a more difficult task than it might initially appear. Sharmaine is based in Singapore and faced several practical issues when delivering a booth for Intermodal Europe.
The enormous distance between Singapore and Amsterdam was an obvious complexity, although easy to handle for industry experts such as Carrier Transicold. However, language barriers and time zones had the potential to slow the project’s progress and result in misunderstandings. For this reason, using an experienced European partner was critical for Sharmaine, as she explains, “If you don’t have a good partner in that location, it’s very difficult to pull off a successful exhibition”. Having worked with Team Hoynck on previous Intermodal Europe events, she was confident that the team had what it took to deliver a fantastic result.
A clear brief
Sharmaine was clear on what she wanted from the Carrier Transicold 2023 booth:
She briefed her Hoynck account manager, Clifford Broekhuisen, who then worked with his design partners to create a series of options. These designs were pleasingly creative – for example, Clifford and his team proposed using a moss wall for eco-friendly, effective and attractive soundproofing. Clifford also recommended new technology, such as digital signage, to amplify Carrier Transicold’s presence and engage the booth visitors with the Carrier Transicold product range.
Sharmaine worked with Clifford to finalise the designs, and once approved, Clifford passed the project across to Erik van Ratingen, who became Sharmaine’s dedicated project manager. Erik took care of finer details, such as graphics, and was responsible for producing and constructing the booth.
Having had problems communicating with previous agencies, Sharmaine commented that working with Hoynck was like a breath of fresh air; “Their communication was excellent, and there were very few issues. And when we did have hiccups, they would always come to me with a solution – that’s something I really appreciated”.
A reliable approach
Despite the geographical distance, communication was easy. The initial project stages were handled through scheduled calls, and once the design was finalised, emails, quick calls and instant messaging kept the project on track. Sharmaine trusted Erik completely, “I’d message Erik during my working day, and he would respond once he started work. It was fluid, and there was no time lag - I knew that so long as Erik knew the brief, everything would be OK”.
Erik’s experienced approach meant Sharmaine had minimal involvement in setting up the exhibition, saying, “I simply had to arrange for our products to be shipped to the location - Hoynck took care of everything else!”
Going the extra mile
With the event drawing closer, Sharmaine arrived ahead of time so she could oversee the booth construction. She was delighted that everything was perfectly on track and that the entire team – contractors and the direct Hoynck team - were wholly committed, observing that “No one was sitting around drinking coffee – everyone was on it.” She was also reassured by how the Hoynck team went the extra mile by providing her with PPE – a high visibility jacket, hard hat, and safety boots - whenever she arrived on site.
An outstanding success
The Carrier Transicold booth was a triumph! The design felt intuitive and accessible, allowing stand visitors to engage with the products on display and appreciate the hospitality area as they networked. The soundproofed meeting rooms were a challenging brief, yet the moss walls worked perfectly. This gave the Carrier Transicold team additional reassurance of complete privacy. Sharmaine told us, “It helped so much with us having in-depth conversations and never feeling as if somebody was listening in, especially with conversations about things like product pricing.” Not only were these meeting rooms soundproofed, but they were also exceptionally spacious, with two easily accommodating up to eight people. They were so effective that Carrier Transicold’s clients quickly appropriated them; as Sharmaine explains, “We knew the booth was a success when our clients asked to use our meeting rooms for their own meetings!”
Sharmaine and the Carrier Transicold team were thrilled with their presence at Intermodal 2023 and look forward to repeating this success at future events.
"I'm constantly impressed with the Hoynck team and how they work internally. Everything is handed over perfectly, and all team members have the same level of information; I never had to repeat myself or share information more than once. Even when Clifford went on holiday and someone else had to stand in, it was seamless.
They know trade shows inside out and are always abreast of the latest MICE trends. If you want your booth to look good, they’re the people to go to!”