Chicago Loses Trade Show Business

The Chicago Tribune reports:

McCormick Place, Chicago's massive exhibition hall, last year chalked up its weakest performance in five years, according to data released this week.

And 2005 may be the hall's worst year since 1989, the earliest year for which data is available online.

Last year McCormick Place hosted 71 trade, consumer and public shows, attracting 2.17 million people to shows that used 10.33 million square feet of exhibit space. These were the lowest figures in the past five years, according to statistics posted on the Chicago Convention and Tourism Bureau's Web site.

The bureau's Web site no longer posts earlier data, but it used to list attendance numbers back to 1994 and exhibit space numbers back to 1989.

Although the bureau declined to provide historical data, explaining that key people were out of the office Friday, the newspaper found archived bureau data at another site.

Last year was a far cry from the record year of 2000. In that year, about 3.33 million people attended 82 shows that occupied about 16.03 million square feet of exhibit space, according to an earlier convention bureau posting.

Maybe the $444 an hour forklift operators at McCormick Place might be too high compared to other markets? The Realtors' show is the latest to leave town.