EuroSkills 2018 Budapest is the European Championship of Skills the biggest biennial vocational event in  Europe where young professionals under 25 compete in all the main industrial areas represented in six groups – Creative Arts and Fashion, Manufacturing and Engineering Technology, Transportation and Logistics, Information and Communication Technology, Social and Personal Services, and Construction and Building Technology. The participants arrive form the 28 member countries of WorldSkills Europe the owner of the competition in order to find out who is the most talented in the continent in such skills bricklayers thorough bakers to electrical installation technicians.

Objectives, planning and execution
Organizing this event was a huge opportunity to prove the importance of the quality of vocational education and the importance of skills in achieving economic growth. The huge attention that comes with organizing such an event gave the perfect opportunity to bring together leaders of government, education, business and industry and use this event as a catalyst for further transformation of the vocational training in Hungary and to attract considerably more students in the future.

37 workshops were to be set up and turned into professional and high level production areas for 3-4 days and then turned off again. All skills have special industry regulations, health and safety regulations and rules how professionals can work in correct conditions.

The competitions took place in five event halls in 180-1600sqm size competition areas totalling 40thousand square meters in Hall A, D, G and F.

The conferences took place in two meeting rooms 100pax and 280pax in Hall B. The exhibition totalled 6000 square meters with 45 exhibitors –sponsors, member countries and government bodies. Two thirds of the stands were custom design, the rest were shell scheme.

There was a 2600 square meter restaurant tent where 1300 guests were served at the same time. In addition 20 organisers’ offices, 3 VIP rooms and a 5600sqm storage hall was also provided.

The build up period started 9 days before the first competition day. Before the event was opened for the public two test days were carried out, so build up had to be completed in 7 days.

The competition at HUNGEXPO was open to the public, after a pre-registration, the visit was free of charge.  Daily visitor numbers reached 30-35k totalling 100k attendees in three days.

Transportation challenges, visitor flow – To be able to raise the number of visitors transportation was organized for the students from the countryside. That meant that the daily number of visitor buses were around 300 that reached the site every day. Special traffic restrictions and road closures had to be implemented to achieve as quick and effective flow of traffic as possible. Because of the high number of vehicles, the allocation of bus stops and the coordination of visistors arriving by train also required on-site management and coordination.

The goal of the communication and PR campaign was twofold: to raise awareness in Hungary about the EuroSkills competition and to engage the young generation towards vocational skills.
The primary target was elementary and secondary school audience, including students, their parents, and teachers who have an influence on the younger generation’s career choices.

The campaign included:
– national campaign (outdoor, television, print)
– online campaign
– social media
– PR in the above

Innovation and creativity
The owner of the competition WorldSkills Europe has an inner quality assurance system that is used during such type of events. The system has two parts: technical preparedness and participation experience.
The biggest challenge of these type of events is technical preparedness, because everything has to be on site and functioning by the time participants arrives, there are no second chances. Since the equipment was provided just in time and mostly by sponsors with such variety it is extremely difficult to carry this out.
All workshop is monitored daily in terms of preparedness and functionality, with 3 different statuses: red – big issue, yellow – small issue, green – no issue. Unprecedented in this events there were no other status given out but green, thanks to the committed partners and the excellent built up services.

Increased visitor experience: TRY A SKILL areas

The main industrial areas were represented in six groups – Creative Arts and Fashion, Manufacturing and Engineering Technology, Transportation and Logistics, Information and Communication Technology, Social and Personal Services, and Construction and Building Technology. In order to increase the visitor experience, and engage the youngsters special career orientation „islands” were created near the 37 competition areas where it was possible to try the basic activities that are typical in the skill. Overall 29 different Try a Skill workshops were built up and operated to represent 33 skills (from joinery to hairdressing) all across the whole competition area.

Effectiveness and results
The event overall was highly praised and successful according to both visitor and both participant feedback, truly setting up new standards to the next organizers.

The event summary in figures:
9 SET UP, 3 EVENT DAYS
28 COUNTRIES REPRESENTED
37 SKILLS, 40,000SQM WORKSHOP AREAS
525 COMPETITORS
470 EXPERTS AND JURY
60 000 M2 AREA FOR THE COMPETITION, AND SUPPORTING EVENTS (CONFERENCE, EXHIBITION, CATERING)
29 TRY A SKILL AREAS
700 VOLUNTEERS (with a 95% turn up rate)
350 MEDIA REPRESENTATIVES (approx. 100 more than the previous event)
85 320 INDIVIDUAL VISITORS (approx. 11.000 more than previous event)
8 224 CEREMONY SPECTATORS (approx. 1.500 more than previous event)
250 PARTICIPANTS AT THE CONFERENCE PROGRAM (free of charge but registration required, full house which is unique)

Media interest
In total, 261 international an 98 Hungarian media representatives pre-registered to cover the EuroSkills Budapest 2018 competition. Including its opening and closing ceremonies and the side events, the competition received 542 media coverage.

UPDATE: Euroskills Budapest 2018, HUNGEXPO’s biggest event last year wins Silver Prize at the ‘Oscar gala of events’, Global Eventex Awards.

​The winners were announced on March 26, 2019, and in the Educational Event category, EuroSkills Budapest 2018 won an outstanding second place. The Global Eventex Awards is one of the largest international event competions that have been awarded the most outstanding events since 2009 in six different categories. In 2018, a total of 331 events were nominated in 42 subcategories, from over 80 countries worldwide.

„We are proud that Hungexpo was the host and organizing partner of EuroSkills Budapest”- said Gábor Ganczer, CEO. After four years of preliminary work, hundreds of people were working to bring this great prestige event to a success. This was the largest event of all our international hosted events, and it was a great success.” added Mr Ganczer.

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