Big 5 didn’t offer a blue-sky future but plenty of practical advice

Judging from this week's cover it may appear that Sandro Verticchio, founder of the Antologia Collection and an exhibitor at the Big 5, is offering precious stones to buyers along with the moon and the stars. But sadly that is not the case.

Still, Verticchio who was making his first trek to the Dubai show, was one of thousands of exhibitors to offer specialised products to builders and developers. In Verticchio's case it was ceramic basins.

The fascinating thing about this year's Big 5, which wrapped up last Wednesday, was the lack of pouty faces among the 50,000 or so visitors and the more than 3,000 vendors trying to sell them stuff.

Certainly there was plenty of talk in the aisles and booths about what the future holds for developers and builders. Real estate sales are down. Projects are being put on hold. People have been laid off. But rather than cry in their tea, many exhibitors were ready to provide solutions to what ails the industry.

The Americans and a number of Western European companies were only too eager to knock some of the existing construction practices in the Middle East, but had the good manners to offer ideas about how best to solve them. Ok, ok, so solving some of the industry ills is to buy their products, but self-serving pitches were kept at a minimum.

For those paying attention, Construction Week went daily for five days, giving the industry a blow- by-blow account of what was going on at the show. Even quicker news was posted on our website, constructionweekonline.com. And in this issue of the magazine, we recap the best of the best news from the show.

Note, though, rather than focus on projects and onsite business, we pay attention primarily to what the Big 5 had to offer: products and services.

Notice that many Italian companies made a big splash this year with the debut of Verticchio's Antologia Collection. The Italy-based Oikos Paints also was there with its eco-friendly water-based paints.

Elsewhere, a Turkish contingent offered ideas on how contractors can cut costs, while the Luxembourg group touted its social model as a template to minimise the effects of the global economic crisis.

So, no, the show was not an end-all to solving the industry's problems with offerings of fabulous wealth and a future full of blue skies, daisies and rolling green meadows. Instead, developers, builders and investors got practical advice, a look at the latest products and services and a glimmer of an idea of what's in the future for the construction.

And overall, it appears to be pretty bright.

Rob Wagner is the editor of Construction Week.

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