Retailers take to Facebook Live as Comex goes fully online
Emcee Victoria Cheng announcing limited-time deals for products such as laptops, smartphones and television sets during Best Denki's live stream, on Sept 3, 2020.
PHOTO: The Straits Times
PUBLISHED ONSeptember 04, 2020 1:15 AMByLester Wong
SINGAPORE - This year's Comex technology show is being held in a fully virtual format for the first time, but will offer the same deep discounts as exhibitors take to Facebook Live to showcase their best deals for consumers.
Major electronics retailer Best Denki on Thursday (Sept 3) kicked off the first live show at 8pm, garnering around 7,000 views and 2,500 comments as of 9pm.
Limited-time deals for products such as laptops, smartphones and television sets were announced by emcee Victoria Cheng live on the show, and later put up on Best Denki's website.
The retailer's show occupies the first slot of two scheduled to be held daily on Comex's Facebook page from Thursday till Sept 13 by various exhibitors. The other is at 9pm, and was helmed by iRobot on Thursday.
Orders are placed individually with each exhibitor, who will provide further instructions for consumers during the show.
Other exhibitors staging live shows include Samsung, Creative, Courts and Harvey Norman.
Comex, which drew around 500,000 visitors last year, is organised by Sphere Exhibits, the events arm of Singapore Press Holdings. The company also organises other consumer electronics fairs such as the IT Show, the Tech Show and the Consumer Electronics Exhibition (CEE).
Large-scale events such as consumer electronics exhibitions have been hit hard by the Covid-19 outbreak this year, with Comex the only one of Sphere Exhibits' events to go on as planned.
The IT Show, which was supposed to take place in March, has been postponed twice this year owing to health concerns over Covid-19.
The CEE, which was originally slated for May, has been postponed to next year.
Sphere Exhibits business director Eric Ng said live streaming will be a part of all the company's events going forward.
"As we are still unable to organise a physical event, we have decided to collaborate with brands like Samsung, Sennheiser and many more to bring the best deals with products up to 50 per cent off for the upcoming Facebook Live streams," he said.
"We thank all our partners for their support and look forward to bringing the IT Show back next year."
This article was first published in The Straits Times. Permission required for reproduction.