Continuing concerns about the pandemic have prompted the Global Market Development Center (GMDC)|Retail Tomorrow to announced a series of virtual events for 2021 that will build on its virtual General Merchandise (GM) Conference and Selfcare Summit events last October.
According to GMDC, "Focused on general merchandise, selfcare, housewares and holiday seasonal categories and scheduled over several weeks, event attendees will have the flexibility to schedule strategic and discovery meetings throughout the year to more frequently engage with current and potential trading partners:
"April 6-23: Spring GM and Selfcare Strategic Executive Connection (SEC) Meetings, in partnership with the International Housewares Association (IHA).
"June 1-11: Summer GM and Selfcare Discovery Sessions (Buyer’s Choice)
September 14-23: Fall GM and Selfcare Strategic Executive Connection (SEC) Meetings.
"October 13-14: Holiday Seasonal Strategic and Discovery Sessions."
“Last October, we shifted our legacy GM Conference and Selfcare Summit events from in-person to a virtual setting in an effort to navigate the ongoing pandemic, while continuing to deliver opportunities for our members to conduct business despite the disruption caused by COVID-19,” said Patrick Spear, president & CEO of GMDC|Retail Tomorrow. “Following our successful pivot, we gathered feedback from and listened to our members, evaluating what worked well during our virtual events and identifying where we could improve. We quickly discovered that more frequent, category-specific events better position our members to conduct business and grow in the ever-evolving COVID-19 landscape, and our unique capabilities to facilitate strategic and meaningful connections position us to fulfill this industry need.”
