Pandemic prompted National Confectioners Association to look beyond longtime Chicago venue; rotation of cities starts in 2024

For more than two decades, the National Confectioners Association was happy holding its annual Sweets & Snacks Expo at McCormick Place in Chicago. Then the pandemic hit, and Illinois' ban on large gatherings led NCA to look elsewhere for 2021. (The show was canceled in 2020.)

Indianapolis worked out so well in 2021 that the association on March 15 announced that the Midwestern city will be the show's new home, along with Las Vegas. Indianapolis and Las Vegas will alternate hosting the expo from 2024 through 2032, NCA CEO John Downs said in a press call.

"The decision about our show's future was driven by our exhibitor and attendee community," Downs said. "We had a tremendous experience in 2021 in Indianapolis, and we did it safe and sound for our attendee community. … It was Hoosier hospitality on full display."

Downs said space limitations in Chicago prevented NCA from reaching its future growth goals. McCormick Place has 2.6 million square feet, more than three times the size of the Indiana Convention Center & Lucas Oil Stadium's 745,000 square feet. But the Chicago venue also hosts many other big shows each spring. The National Restaurant Association Show will be held for the first time in three years at McCormick Place May 21-24, overlapping with the May 23-26 Sweets & Snacks Expo, its 25^th anniversary in Chicago. The 2023 event will also be in Chicago.

"We usually have about 18,000 attendees, 90 countries and around 800 exhibitors," Downs said. "And Las Vegas and Indianapolis presented the best options to us for the future that were available to meet our growing demand for our show."

The new rotation will be three cycles of two years in Indianapolis followed by one year in Las Vegas. All the shows will happen in May.

Leonard Hoops, CEO of Visit Indy, called the move to Indianapolis "a match made in candy heaven." Indiana's governor and the Indianapolis mayor advocated for the Sweets & Snacks Expo to move to the city, Hoops said.

Indianapolis's convention center hosted a number of events safely during the pandemic, including the NCAA basketball tournament in 2021.

"But we hadn't hosted a true trade show where people were coming in from all over the country and in some case from beyond the borders," Hoops said. "The whole downtown Indianapolis has been built for 50 years now to host major conventions and major sporting events. … I think that's where NCA and its board and its members looked and said, ‘We can really grow here,' because when you take over a convention in Indy, you're really taking over all of downtown Indy."

NCA announced in October 2020 that it would move the 2021 show to Indianapolis because of uncertainty around whether the show could be held in Chicago. Illinois was prohibiting large indoor gatherings at the time and it was unknown when those restrictions would be lifted. Indiana, however, was allowing organizations to hold large gatherings if they submitted a public health plan for approval. 

This story was updated March 18 to include the square footage of both the Indianapolis Convention Center itself and Lucas Oil Stadium.