Maguire, Novatec bow out of NPE show

Citing budget concerns, auxiliary equipment suppliers Maguire Products and Novatec, Inc. have pulled out of exhibiting at the NPE 2009 trade show in Chicago.

“Under normal circumstances we would be building equipment to display at NPE and be spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to present our company’s products to customers during the upcoming five-day show – but these are not normal times,” said Steve Maguire, president of Maguire Products, and Conrad Bessemer, president and CEO of Novatec, in a joint statement. “We are in the midst of a serious recession and we have to question the sense of spending our customers’ money on a five-day exhibit.”

The decision of the two Pennsylvania-based firms follows what Maguire and Bessemer described as “months of conversations with customers, SPI officials and other exhibitors”.

“This decision isn’t an overall cost cutting move for either of our companies,” Maguire said. “Instead, it’s just a decision we have made as to where best to spend the money. By not attending the show, we’ll be enhancing our web program, preserving jobs and, in fact, dramatically accelerating new technology programs.”