The Ageing Workforce Building Exhibitions
If you ever get the chance to watch an exhibition being built, stop and listen. Under the rattle of drills and the thud of materials hitting the floor, you’ll hear something else: the aches, groans and tiredness of an ageing workforce.
The people behind opening morning
This isn’t about the planners. It’s about the people who deliver: carpet fitters, electricians, graphics fitters, carpenters, riggers and general crew. They work long, unsociable hours so that a show looks ready when the doors open.
If you’re in and out of exhibitions as often as we are, you’ll see the same dependable faces at every build, working flat out. We rely on them enormously.
We have a saying in this industry: you’re either in exhibitions for five minutes or for 30 years. It’s a niche world that suits very few people, and the ones that have been delivering for years are getting older and heading towards retirement. So what happens when they’ve gone?
What we found on our own build
We recently asked 42 workers on one of our large builds their age:
Age of Contractors
20-29: 6
30-39: 8
40-49: 6
50-59: 10
60-69: 8
70+: 4 (yes, really)
The average age was 47. More than half of the crew (22 of 42) are expected to retire within the next five years.
That’s just on one build, but it points to a much bigger problem. In 10 to 15 years there will be far fewer skilled people left to deliver these events. The industry needs to be attracting, supporting and retaining younger skilled workers now.
The honest job ad
Part of the problem is the job itself. If we wrote an honest advert for a general role on a build, it might look like this:
Wanted: Someone able to walk 20,000 steps a day, seven days a week, from 8am until late. We can’t tell you when you’ll finish; that depends on everyone else. You’ll need patience and calm while you wait for other contractors to finish their work, and then you’ll need to be ready to do it yourself. Waiting times can be longer than A&E, so you must be comfortable standing in the same 30 square metres without getting bored or frustrated. The nearest open toilet is a long walk away. Then you’ll do it all again, over and over, all year round.
Early mornings, late nights, weekends and very little rest. It’s no surprise the industry isn’t flooded with young people stepping up to replace the veterans.
Why good people leave
In our view, the young workers we lose are often the best ones: the people who stay late, work hard and go the extra mile to deliver. They leave because their commitment gets taken advantage of and they are overworked. When too few people do their fair share, the load always falls on the ones who care most. We don’t blame them for walking away. So what can we do?
This isn’t one party’s problem. Venues, organisers and contractors all have a part to play. Here are a few starting thoughts:
- Venues: Could they do more to look after the people building the shows, with better facilities, more toilets open and proper places to rest?
- Organisers: Could Floor Managers or Health & Safety teams pick out the five best workers on the show floor and reward them?
- Contractors: Could reward schemes for finishing on schedule cut time on site and recognise the people who make it happen?
These are only first ideas, and we’d like to go further. Our next step is to run the same survey across a whole event, to see whether the problem affects every trade or hits some harder, such as skilled carpenters.
We’re a busy industry, and the people who deliver it deserve better. If we look after them, we’ll keep the good ones and give the next generation a reason to join.
– Written by Phil Baker, Director
