Is UKREiiF planning to leave Leeds?
While the 2024 edition will be held in Yorkshire for the third consecutive year, organisers have confirmed that the annual property conference could be moved to Manchester, Liverpool, or Birmingham from 2025.
Built Environment Networking, the company behind UKREiiF, has not ruled out keeping the event at Leeds Dock and Royal Armouries beyond 2024, but acknowledges the growth of the conference since its launch in 2022 might prompt the need for a larger venue.
A report by Arup found that Leeds’ hotels were completely full during this year’s three-day event, a statistic that is likely to raise eyebrows ahead of the 2024 edition.
UKREiiF attracted 9,500 official and fringe delegates in 2023 and BEN expects this to increase to 15,000 in 2024.
As a result, 18 additional pavilions and several new buildings are planned, according to the event’s operations director Louise Eyre.
“The event’s footprint is set to double for 2024,” she said.
“We have ambitious plans to expand our audience and the activities at UKREiiF. Hence, we are aiming to future-proof the event by choosing a venue and city that align with our growth expectations.”
Attendees at this year’s UKREiiF that Place North West spoke to suggested that the event was outgrowing its current venue.
As well as the scarcity and cost of hotel rooms, queues for the food trucks were often long and many of the panel discussions were impossible to get into unless you arrived half an hour early.
There were also concerns that, if the weather were to turn, there would be a shortage of places to find shelter as much of the current UKREiiF set-up is outdoor.
It seems that BEN has taken all of this into account, announcing today that four cities – Leeds, Birmingham, Manchester, and Liverpool – have been shortlisted to host the event in 2025, 2026, and 2027.
“The rapid growth of UKREiiF has fast-tracked our plans,” said UKREiiF founder and chief executive Keith Griffiths.
“We’re now exploring options to future-proof the event, prompting our review of the venue and host city. While Leeds remains a contender for 2025 and beyond, and the feedback about the city has been stellar, we’ve been equally impressed by other cities we’ve visited. The potential venues and the teams we might collaborate with make the decision challenging.”
Dino Moutsopoulos, managing partner at Place North, the official media partner for UKREiiF, said: “Over the last two years, UKREiiF has really managed to grab the attention of the property market.
“As a Northern business focused on supporting the Northern property sector for over 16 years, we would be very keen to see the event remain in the North. Liverpool, Leeds, and all have excellent facilities to host medium and large events.”
He added: “UKREiiF has grown both in number and cost in a short time, so keeping the event financially viable for all will be key as it looks to scale. It will be equally interesting to see what the various cities do to try and secure this exciting event.”
Moutsopoulos also suggested Manchester might have an ace up its sleeve when it comes to getting the nod to host UKREiiF, by way of its recently introduced tourist tax. Money generated through this tax could be used to subsidise ticket prices, he said.
UKREiiF 2024 will be held at Leeds Dock from 21 to 23 May.
All I can say is keep it in northern England. Manchester or Liverpool
By Anonymous
Be interesting to see how Leeds copes with 15000 delegates / fringe attendees. It was creaking this year. Stupidly the BCO have planned their conference to clash with UKREiiF in 2024 so maybe that’ll keep numbers down. It needs to move away from Leeds after next year.
By Anonymous
Definitely needs to be in a city with a higher capacity of hotel/accommodation rooms. I know many who weren’t able to attend last year for lack of accommodation.
By YIMBY
Most sensible option to move to Manchester, Liverpool doesn’t have enough hotel rooms.
By Anonymous
if it wants to continue and expanding at the rate it has it will need to consider if Leeds can really accommodate. It was busy this year and not sure how it would have coped if the weather had turned. I think it would be good to see it go to Liverpool rather than Manchester or Birmingham
By Billy Corkhill
Manchester is the obvious choice for a number of reasons not least of which is hotel, venue and transport capacity.
By Anonymous
There are well over 8,000 hotel rooms in Liverpool City Centre alone as of Nov 2022. There is also at least another 8 hotels currently under construction in the City Centre. Then you have the rest of the city, then the 5 other boroughs in the LCR. I think Liverpool could cope thank you very much. Source: Marketing Liverpool HOTELS UPDATE November 2022.
By LiverpoolGentleman
Liverpool regularly hosts events with thousands of delegates. That’s why we have the convention centre.
By John
Liverpool just hosted Eurovison amd about to host another Labour conferance, think it has enough hotel rooms.
By Anonymous
Liverpool and Manchester are both solid options and both have enough rooms when you factor in airbnb and hotels under construction. That being so – and given that both have proven CVs in terms of hosting major events – it’ll come down to which city throws the best party and offers the best welcome. And that, of course, is Liverpool.
By Sceptical
The destination – the city that offers the biggest subvention (and that won’t be Birmingham!!)
By Anonymous
I don’t think the hotels is even an issue at MIPIM loads stay out in Nice…makes you book early rather than wait around. It’s an amazing event, I’d personally like to see Liverpool think it would lend itself well to UKREiiF. Cannot wait for next years in Leeds its going to be packed. Don’t think it helps that Leeds are not an event city so they haven’t got the basics set up like you have in the others on the list. Glad London isn’t on there.
By Anonymous
Conservative conference in Manchester most year’s and lots of venues to choose from. If hotel accommodation is the real issue here though there’s only going to be one winner. It’s not only number of hotel beds available but the highest rated and most searched for in the UK I seem to recall was indeed Manchester. These things matter when you’re booking such a large conference.
By Anonymous
If it was hotel rooms alone that were the issue then it going to be Manchester by a long way. But anyone in the industry knows these things are expensive to host and it’s whoever gives the best deal overall.
By Jadon
Liverpool this year will have hosted Eurovision and Labour party conference. They are more than capable of hosting this event.
By Jeremy S
Liverpool gets my vote for sure. I’m not sure Manchester CC take UKREiiF seriously with their low presence so am surprised they had bid for this event but they need one in the industry with events like Housing flagging to a low/poor attendance this year. As long as its not inside a conference hall it will be a big success. Fingers crossed for the north west.
By Henry B
Definitely has to be Manchester just based on size , transport infrastructure and ability to accommodate such large events. Will be good for the North west if we get another large conference.
By Mr S
If Leeds Doesn’t have enough accommodation to host which I’m surprised at as I’m pretty sure that with the exception of Manchester and possibly Birmingham it has more hotels than any other UK city, then there’s only one city on this list that could host it. Mind you these things often depend on timing too..ie can you get a venue when you want it.
By Al
It’s Liverpool for me.
By Just saying!
Only one winner here for obvious reasons , Manchester for me. agree with the comment about Leeds though.
By Tom
Liverpool is so successful at hosting events such as this plus the added bonus of the friendly people and ease of moving around the city and of course the huge accommodation variety. It stands well above the rest.
By Liverpool4Progress