Olivia PowellThe Event Supplier and Services Association (ESSA) has announced that it has partnered with Anti Copying In Design (ACID), to ‘help protect its members from design theft’, as many of them make creative designs as their core business.
ACID is a trade association for designers and manufacturers which is committed to ‘fighting design theft’ and ‘lobbying Parliament for design law reform’. Many ACID members exhibit their products and designs at trade shows throughout the UK, into Europe and beyond.
Director of ESSA, Andrew Harrison, said: “In preparation for the launch of our industry initiative ‘Design Matters’ we wanted to make sure we had the ability to support our members in this area in a far more professional and robust manner. Being accepted and welcomed as an ACID Partner reinforces our position that we and our members take design and intellectual property in our sector seriously, a move that will be further re-enforced by an amendment to our member bylaws in the near future. I’m really looking forward to working with ACID in this specialised area”.
ACID’s business development consultant, Michael Rawlinson said: “Working in partnership with ESSA to ensure respect and value for original designs and intellectual property relating to exhibition stands and industry events is a great step forward. We hope to continue to support existing ACID members who attend these shows as well as helping ESSA members in their quest for recognition and respect for the design and creative work they undertake.”
ACID has said it hopes the new partnership with ESSA will ‘enable its respective members to interact positively’ and ‘forge new business relationships’.