Over the last couple of months, the Coronavirus Pandemic has had a huge impact globally, and board gaming has not escaped.  For example, the largest distributor in the USA, Alliance Games, has stopped shipping games and the parent company, Geppi Family Enterprises (GFE) have been with-holding payments to vendors.  Just over a month ago, we reported that many conventions had been cancelled, and the UK Games Expo, usually held at the end of May/start of June was postponed until August.  Since then, Friedhelm Merz Verlag GmbH who run the Essen Spiel in October, have stated that they are monitoring the situation in Germany, where Oktoberfest was recently cancelled.

– Image from ukgamesexpo.co.uk

Yesterday, sadly, the directors of UK Games Expo announced that they have now reluctantly taken the decision to cancel the event this year; the next UKGE is now scheduled for 4^th-6^th June 2021.  The 2020 UK Games Expo Award nominees and winners will still be announced in August, however, and the organisers are currently looking at the possibility of a virtual event.  The UK Games Expo does not carry pandemic insurance, so cancellation has serious consequences for their finances, however, in their statement they say have sufficient financial reserves to survive this, although those reserves will be completely depleted.  The overwhelming support on Facebook alone, gives some confidence that the event will survive despite this and will come back even stronger next year.