Announcement; Midland Expo 2013 date.

Midland Expo 2013 will be held on Sunday 28th July 2013.

This is a radical change to our traditional show date and has come about to avoid clashing with other major model shows and with such events as airshows to which many of our regular attendees would be going. The mid May date, that we have in the past used, clashed this year with IPMS Barnet's show at the RAF Museum, Hendon which resulted in a number of traders and clubs that would have liked to be at both shows being forced to make a choice which to attend. The nett  result being that both clubs/shows lost out, and to avoid a repetition of this situation we have liaised with Barnet. For next year the museum have again offered them the same weekend and as IPMS Birmingham is in the position of having a venue with more dates available we have decided to move the date of our show. This in itself threw up a few problems as most weekends during the late spring and early summer period are already taken with other model shows, Bank Holidays, airshows and the like so we have decided on the the last weekend of July which falls into the traditional holiday (Midlands industrial fortnight) period. However, as this has now been largely superceded by more flexible holiday arrangements, especially with the predominance of service industries, it is therefore less of a factor and given the current economic conditions could be turned to our advantage being a relatively cheap day out for cash strapped young families.

We would like to thank IPMS Barnet's show committee for their positive and constructive contribution to our discussions and hope that they will be exhibitors at Midland Expo 2013.

The venue remains the same; Cocks Moors Woods Leisure Centre and Golf Course, Alcester Road South, Kings Heath, Birmingham. B14 6ER.

Midland Expo 2013 show poster

Download a PDF of this poster

Download Poster as a Jpeg file from Flickr.

After the Event!

One Week to go.

It is now only a week until Midland Expo 2012 and everything is (just about) in place.

All the trade spaces have now been sold, the latest additions are SK Miniatures (This year being represented by Oakwood Studios) and Christopher Morris Books.

The hall will be open from 07.30 for traders to set up, with clubs and SIGs being admitted from 08.30. The doors will be opened to the general public at 10.00, pleaae see timetable below

Timetable:

07.30 - Traders commence set-up, access via side and rear double doors. Traders' vehicles to be parked in rear service road.

08.30 - Club and SIG admitted to hall for set-up, members' vehicles, once off-loaded, to be moved to general car park.

10.00 - Doors open to general (paying) public. Rear and side access doors closed.

10.00 to 13.00 - Competition registration.

13.15 - Judges' briefing.

13.30 to 14.30 - Competition judging.

15.30 to 16.00 - Presentation of awards.

16.00 - Show closes, visitors to vacate hall.

16.00 to 18.00 Knock-down, clubs and traders vacate hall.

I8.00 - Hall handed back to Centre staff.

Download a PDF of this timetable.

The (almost) Definative List of Traders and Exhibitors

The list of traders who will be at this year's Midland Expo is now complete, or at least would be had we not had a late cancellation. As a result there are now two spaces available to any trader who would like to attend the show.

If you are a trader and would like to take advantage of this opportunity please contact Roger Hartill, Trader Bookings Secretary as quickly as possible, they will be allocated on a first come first served basis.

The list of confirmed traders is as follows:

Armour Models,  Aviation Book Centre, Avid Reader,  Affinity Models, Clive Davies, DM Trading, El Greco Miniatures, Firefly Models, Form-U-Lay, Hackenbush Models,
Halifax Modellers World, Hollywood Trade, Imperial Gallery, Kit's Kits, Kit Krazy, Klassic Kits, Little cars, Mainly Military, MDP, Mil Mart, Mitches Military Models, Name It, Oakwood Studios, Parabellum, Reedees Miniatures, Scale Aircraft Modelling and Treemendus

This list with links to the traders' own websites can also be found on the Traders Page.

The Exhibitors Page now has an up-to-date list of clubs and SIGs that will be attending, if your club has booked space and does not appear on the list please contact Dave Marsh for clarification.

Early April update

Trade and exhibitor (Club and SIG) spaces are now close to being fully booked - if you are intending to exhibit or trade at Midland Expo 2012 and have not yet done so, please confirm your bookings without delay to secure your spaces.

Over the past few days there have been meetings of the Show Management Committee and and with the venue's management to resolve outstanding issues. From our experience of last year's show, areas of particular concern to us were as follows:

Catering:

In our meeting with the venue's management representative we gave high priority to the catering, last year this was an area of criticism and we have impressed upon them the importance of having adequate staffing levels and sufficient supplies of food and beverages. An additional catering source this year will be the nearby pub The Horseshoe Inn (see parking below), which serves Sunday lunches and snacks.

Parking:

In addition to the Centre's 500 spaces the management of The Horseshoe Inn have kindly made around 30  spaces in their car park available for visitors to Midland Expo 2012, the pub is a short distance from Cocks Moor Woods Leisure Centre and Golf Course (See map below) and serves food as well as the usual liquid refreshment. The manager has asked that any visitors use the rear parking area (to the left on the photograph below) leaving the spaces nearest to the pub for their regulars. Further on-street parking is available on Warstock Road (See map) a little farther on, past The Horseshoe Inn, this is a dual carriageway and there are plenty of spaces in front of the factory units on the left-hand side of the road.

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March Update

A show management committee meeting was held 1st March to review the preparations for Midland Expo 2012, so far we have had an excellent response from Clubs, Special Interest Groups(SIGs) and Traders. A few traders who attended last year have not been able to book this year due to other commitments elsewhere but several others who were unable to come to last year's show have either booked or made provisional enquiries.

As always with a new venue, last year not everything went according to plan and a number of problems are being addressed, there will be some minor changes to the floor plan to make better use of the space and we are currently looking at potential overflow parking provisions. Although the centre has a 300 space car park it is in constant use by people using the leisure facilities and golf course and it does tend to fill up rapidly which resulted in some complaints from visitors last year.

We also intend to meet with the the centre management in the near future and one of the issues we will be taking up with them is the catering facilities. Despite our pointing out prior to last year's show that they could expect a rush of hungry modellers early in the morning they soon became overwhelmed, we will be reinforcing the message that they need to have adequate supplies and staffing levels to cope.

Also we are pleased to announce that our friends from the Forever Forties group will again

be in attendance with some of their vintage vehicles.


Finally a reminder that with less than three months to Midland Expo 2012 trade and exhibitor spaces are filling up rapidly, so if you are intending to display or trade at the show  and have not yet booked you need to do so now.

For the list of traders who have already booked please go to the Traders Page.