Export Home 2008: Elsa Leite, president of AE Paredes speaks about Export Home
Export Home 2008: “The Design Event always seems to appear with a renewed image”
Heading on to its eighth edition, the Design Event promises to surprise all with its image. Once again, it will fulfil its purpose of highlighting companies that invest in design and innovation. Elsa Leite, secretary-general of AE Paredes (Paredes Business Association), one of the organisations behind the event together with Paredes City Council, mentions, in interview, the importance of the Design Event for the sector and the new features of the eighth edition.
In 2008, Export Home will be celebrating its 20th anniversary. What, for AE Paredes, is the importance of this event?
Elsa Leite: Export Home is an opportunity for furniture entrepreneurs in the Paredes area to demonstrate the quality which prevails in this sector.
How many companies from Paredes are represented at Export Home?
About fifty.
Since when has AEP been taking part in Export Home?
Since 1989.
What year did the Design Event start? How did the opportunity to host this event emerge?
The Design Event began in 2000 and emerged from the need to highlight and reward the exhibitor companies at the exhibition which showed the strongest commitment to design and innovation. The challenge was set and was received very enthusiastically, both by the companies and by partner entities (Exponor ESAD- Escola Superior de Arte e Design and AICEP).
After all these editions, what is your assessment of this initiative?
A very positive one. The Design Event is now going on to its eighth edition and has already participated in an international event, specifically in the Salon du Meuble in Paris in 2007.
What pieces enrolled in the Design Event would you highlight for their quality, boldness and commercial success?
All those pieces that have been awarded prizes and honours.
Do you think that the Design Event has brought designers closer to furniture manufacturers?
Absolutely. The event generated a need for companies to invest more and more in innovative products, which required an investment in qualified labour, namely, in the field of design.
How do you view that connection today? Can Portuguese furniture already compete, in terms of design, with international furniture, particularly furniture from countries such as Italy and France?
The main difference between Portuguese, French and Italian furniture is not based on the quality of manufacture, but rather on how these countries work their own brand. The Portugal Brand still has a long path ahead of it, to reach the same standing as these countries.
In 2008, will the Design Event be following the same format at previous editions?
In terms of its image, the Design Event always has a renewed image, but the underlying principles are the same.
How many pieces will take part in the competition?
There will be 17 pieces in the competition.
This year, the pieces enrolled in the Design Event will also be on display during Exponor Inhouse? Why? What is the advantage of this?
Exponor Inhouse is an exhibition aimed at the final consumer. This exhibition acts as an acceptance test for a product, which is always important for companies.
A “catwalk” of creativity
One of the new features of the 2008 edition of Export Home is the Catwalk for Innovation. “This is an initiative which aims to present and promote alternative pieces of furniture, which stem from the passions and creativity of Portuguese designers. With this event we hope to write some of the future of design in Portuguese and open it up to the market”, António Proença, director of the exhibition, sums up.
The Catwalk for Innovation is an Exponor initiative sponsored by the company Outros Mercadus, with the institutional backing of APD - Portuguese Designers Association, in collaboration with the designer Nuno Sá Leal.
For this equipment designer, this parallel activity at Export Home “aims to show the furniture world the best of what is done in technology and design”.
Nuno Sá Leal goes further and adds that the ultimate goal of the Catwalk for Innovation is to “encourage centres of scientific competence (that is, universities) to introduce new technologies to the sector”, as is the case with some of the products which will be on display between the 26th of February and the 1st of March. “A thread made from basalt, which can be used to produce all sorts of fabrics and knits will be on show at the Catwalk for Innovation”, he reveals.
In its first year, Nuno Sá Leal hopes, essentially, to promote greater contact between “designers/technology and manufacturers”, which means that the visit by the “300 exhibitors to the Catwalk for Innovation” is already considered a “big plus for the initiative”.
Therefore, giving visibility to the creativity of people who are addicted to design is one of the purposes of the Catwalk for Innovation. An idea which will be brought to life in an arena that will be a stage for dreams and passions, where concepts are realised, explored by the minds of experienced designers.
“I think this initiative is fantastic”, Liliana Vidal, from Outros Mercadus, declares.
In her opinion, “all participants are set to gain with the Catwalk for Innovation”, although she defends a new organisational format, in later editions, in order to attract more projects.
The Catwalk for Innovation is aimed at designers, architects and recent graduates in design.
Furniture exports exceed imports
The furniture sector represents 0.7% of exports and 0.5% of imports in Portuguese traditional trade and this percentage has remained stable over the last four years, as can be read in the study by the AEP (Portuguese Business Association) on the furniture sector (read the study in full at
www.exporthome.exponor.pt).
We should highlight, however, that in the last three years, the growth rate of furniture exports was always greater than the growth rate of imports (average annual growth rate of 8.3%, versus 5.4% respectively). Moreover, the data for the period from January to August 2007 showed a very positive evolution of the trade balance and, for the first time since 1997, exports exceeded imports. 17.7 million euros was the trade balance in this sector, according to the same source.
This result was in part due to the significant increase in exports (rate of change across same period of 9.3%), combined with a decrease in imports (rate if change across same period of -0.5%).
However, it is still early to confirm a possible reversal in the trend in the international furniture trade. In effect, the data for the period between January and August 2006 also showed a positive trade balance (though at a much lower level than the same period in 2007), but the calculations for the year showed a negative trade balance, of roughly 6.3 million euros, which may suggest some seasonality in trade.
7 233 companies with a business turnover worth 2 161 million euros
According to data for 2004, the furniture sector comprises 7 233 companies, which provide 54 982 jobs and have a business turnover worth 2 161 million euros.
According to the experts, furniture manufacturing is characterised as labour intensive (the weight of staffing costs in GVA was 74.4% in 2004), that produces mainly for the national market.
As in the past, the entrepreneurial fabric is still heavily concentrated in the North of the country, particularly in the Paredes and Paços de Ferreira councils, though a second core can be found in the Leiria district, which is characterised by slightly larger companies.
