EUROMOVERS visits Catania

EUROMOVERS held its annual conference at the Four Points by Sheraton Hotel overlooking the Ionian Sea just north of Catania in Sicily from 25 – 28 May, 2023.

This year there were 109 attendees, a record turnout for the event.  Attendees came from as far away as Australia, the Far East and the USA, plus most European countries. 

The EUROMOVERS conference focusses on business.  The plenary meetings were facilitated by Steve Jordan, Editor of The Mover magazine.  Throughout the two main business days Steve introduced a range of speakers and moderated two workshop sessions to help extract views from the membership on a range of pertinent issues. 

Business speakers on day one included: Tobia Crisostomo from EUROVAN, who talked about European consolidation; Giorgio Genta from TriGlobal, discussing lead generation; and Francesco Argiró giving a seminar on Search Engine Optomisation.  On the second day Geraldine Collett from Halo Financial, explained the good sense of recommending financial services to customers for the transfer of assets; Gerard Geijtenbeek from Roldo Rent gave an interesting presentation on future developments that might affect the industry; Ian Studd, Director General of BAR explained an little about the world’s oldest moving trade association, past, present and future; and Magali Horbert, from FIDI, gave an enlightening talk on sustainability in the moving industry. 

The conference also featured the EUROMOVERS AGM, presided over by Paul Fox, EUROMOVERS President, who also presented his annual Supervisory Board’s report; and the Executive Board’s report by General Manager Thomas Juchum.  Thomas also presented the group’s Circle of the Distinguished medal to Eddy Walschot from Servaes Services in Brussels for his extraordinary service to EUROMOVERS over many years.     

The EUROMOVERS conference always includes two unique features.  All the guests and first-time attendees are given a five-minute slot on the stage to introduce themselves.  This helps them assimilate quickly into the group and makes sure that all the delegates are familiar with the services their companies offer.  Secondly, Thomas Juchum presents his tonnage and quality evaluations in which members rate the performance of each other in terms of administration, financial responsibility and service quality.  Awards are presented to those companies receiving the top marks. 

Although there was plenty of business at EUROMOVERS, there was some down time too with an organised walking tour of the historic town of Catania, and dinner in a local restaurant. On day two, there was a sight-seeing tour by bus and train culminating in dinner at the Cavanera winery with Mt Etna, that had erupted only three days before, looking down on the guests from over 3,500 metres above.  Entertainment was provided by a local Tarantella band of musicians and dancers. It was utterly splendid. 

Sponsorship for the conference was provided by: Quartarone Traslochi in Catania, Transpak in Germany, Halo Financial and QSS in the UK, and Roldo Rent, TriGlobal and ABS Containers in the Netherlands.

The next EUROMOVERS conference will take place in Ibiza, Spain.