UK Games Expo in Birmingham is set to draw 45,000 visitors over three days this weekend as the tabletop gaming event stages its 20th show at the NEC. The convention, which runs from Friday to Sunday, will spread across more than 72,000 sq m at the exhibition centre and the nearby Hilton hotel.
For Richard Denning, the scale is still hard to take in. He said he borrowed £5,000 from his wife to help fund the first event, when the show was held in a masonic hall and drew about 900 attendees. This year, the expo is expected to host 900 exhibitors across six halls, up 15% on last year, as board games, roleplaying games and miniature wargames fill the site alongside shows, seminars, re-enactors and cosplay.
Organisers describe UK Games Expo at Birmingham's NEC as the largest event of its kind in the UK and one of the biggest in the world. That claim sits on top of numbers that would have been unthinkable at the start: the first show cost £18,000 to run, while this year's event is projected to have a turnover of about £2.2m. The wider UK tabletop games market is estimated to be worth between £450m and £500m, a sign of how much business now sits behind what began as a gathering for enthusiasts.
Denning, who set up the expo with a church minister from Kidderminster and a retired GP from Sutton Coldfield, said the growth had been more than he once imagined. He said it was about seeing something work, watching people have fun and knowing it had been worthwhile. Asmodee will have 10 stands and demonstrate 160 games at the show, using the weekend to meet fans face to face and push new releases into a market that now has a major annual showcase in Birmingham.
The event's leap from a modest hall to a vast NEC footprint is the point. UK Games Expo has become a commercial heavyweight as well as a hobby gathering, and the only confirmed next step is this weekend's run from Friday to Sunday, when organisers will find out how close the show can get to the upper limit of its own success.
