Horesta · 2027

Agoris analysis · updated September 2026

Key facts

• Horesta is the trade show for cafés, hotels, restaurants and the food trades of south-west France: bakers, pastry chefs, butchers, cheesemongers, caterers, restaurateurs, hoteliers and bartenders from the Pyrénées-Atlantiques, Landes and Hautes-Pyrénées meet their suppliers here.
• Next edition: the 7th, from Sunday 14 to Tuesday 16 March 2027, at the Halle d'Iraty in Biarritz. Opening hours: 10am to 6pm on Sunday, 10am to 7pm on Monday, 10am to 4pm on Tuesday.
• Organiser: Expomedia, a trade show organising company based in Anglet. No co-organiser.
• Frequency: every two years, in odd-numbered years, since the first edition in 2015.
• Results of the 2025 edition, held 23-25 March: 150 exhibitors across 5,000 m², attendance of 5,258 visitors, including 3,122 unique visitors, up 23% on 2023.
• Free entry, for trade visitors only, on a badge.

Who exhibits

Exhibitor profile

Horesta covers six trades, as listed by the show's own website: catering, butchery, pastry, baking, hospitality and cheesemongery. The offer follows the full supply chain of a food-service establishment: raw materials and milling, food and drink products, kitchen and laboratory equipment, refrigeration and air conditioning, tills and payment systems, hygiene and traceability, workwear, insurance, energy, recruitment and booking software.

The show's hallmark is its local roots. Many of the 2025 exhibitors were businesses from south-west France: south-western wine producers, craft breweries, duck charcuterie and preserve makers, Basque drinks distributors, bakery equipment installers. They stood alongside national groups seeking out the artisans and restaurateurs of a tourist area where the season starts in spring.

Notable exhibitors

The exhibitor list published on the show's website is the one for the 2025 edition; the 2027 list is due to go online in November 2026.

In 2025, exhibitors included, on the equipment side, Rational France, Unox, Winterhalter and Salvis France; on the milling side, Grands Moulins de Paris, Minoterie Bourseau and Moulin de Colagne; on the drinks and coffee side, Lavazza France, Cafés Richard, la Cave de Jurançon and la Cave d'Irouléguy; on the distribution side, Sysco and Metro Anglet. The three UMIH trade unions for the Basque Country, Landes and Hautes-Pyrénées held a stand at the visitor entrance.

Visitor quality

The show is restricted to trade professionals in hospitality and food service, the food trades and food retail, as well as professionals in outdoor accommodation and leisure and tourism facilities: campsites, self-catering cottages, leisure parks, tourist residences and holiday villages. The page aimed at exhibitors also lists bowling alleys, casinos, nightclubs, wine merchants, delicatessens and contract catering operators.

The organiser distinguishes between attendance, 5,258 entries in 2025, and unique visitors, 3,122 in the same year. Its 2025 survey found that 86% of visitors were very satisfied with their visit, 96% would recommend the show, and 49% do not visit any other trade show. This last figure sums up Horesta's appeal for a supplier: nearly one visitor in two attends no other trade show. No third-party audit of the OJS type has been published.

Visitor recruitment is local and direct: paper invitations, emails, calls and text messages, as well as invitations handed out during visits to bars, restaurants and food shops along the Basque coast, inland Basque Country and southern Landes, according to the organiser's published communication plan.

Events & community

Conference programme

The 2027 programme has not been published: the website says the list of talks and masterclasses will go online in November 2026. The 2025 edition sets the format: an armagnac masterclass led by the director of the Bureau National Interprofessionnel de l'Armagnac (BNIA), a talk by the president of the national UMIH's restaurant branch on the sector's current affairs, a talk on recruiting and retaining talent in hospitality, and another on cyber risk prevention with Groupama.

In 2025, Tuesday morning was devoted to contract catering, with a meeting of Agores, the association of contract catering directors. It covered direct purchasing under the Egalim law, online purchase reporting and alternatives to plastic.

Competitions and demonstrations

Competitions are the show's main draw. In 2025 they included the best baguette in Béarn, the best baguette in the Basque Country and the best croissant in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques, run with the Fédération de la boulangerie des Pyrénées-Atlantiques, a decorated-piece trophy for baking apprentices from the Bayonne and Mont-de-Marsan training centres, a croquembouche competition open to apprentices and school pupils, a mixology competition created that year around blanche d'armagnac with the BNIA, and a waiters' and waitresses' race through the aisles.

Chefs, pastry chefs and bakers from south-west France, including several Meilleurs Ouvriers de France, sponsor the show and sit on the judging panels. The 2027 list is due to be published in November 2026. For the next edition, the show's Highlights page announces two new trade-only competitions, one for caterers and one for pastry, plus the second running of the waiters' race.

Community & networks

Several trade organisations hold their annual general meeting during the show: the UMIH Pays Basque AGM, the Fédération de la boulangerie des Pyrénées-Atlantiques AGM, and the meeting of Agores members from Nouvelle-Aquitaine. The institutional partners listed for 2025 are UMIH Pays Basque, Landes, Hautes-Pyrénées and Béarn et Soule, the bakers' federation, the Pyrénées-Atlantiques chamber of trades, Agores, the Biarritz hotel school and Destination Biarritz.

The show also attracts collective exhibitors. The Qualité Landes association, which brings together Landes-area producers under official quality labels, trialled Exp'Hotel in Bordeaux in 2023, then Horesta in 2025; it told Les Annonces Landaises in June 2025 that in Biarritz, on the eve of the summer season, it had reached outdoor-accommodation and bed-and-breakfast catering, in addition to its presence at Sirha Lyon.

Expomedia also runs the brand in the north of France with Horesta Hauts-de-France, scheduled in Lille from 19 to 21 September 2027: this is a separate show, not to be confused with the Biarritz edition.

On site: what you need to know

The show is held at the Halle d'Iraty, rue de Pitchot in Biarritz, an exhibition venue outside the town centre, around one kilometre from Biarritz airport and Biarritz railway station according to the organiser. The venue has two halls of 2,500 m² and 2,650 m² that can be connected, plus an outdoor exhibition area.

By bus, from Biarritz town hall, take line A1 to the Biarritz Gare stop, then line C to the Iraty stop; from Place Clemenceau, take line 10 to Biarritz Gare, then line C. By car, follow the signs for Halle d'Iraty and then the show's own signage: a free 850-space visitor car park is reserved at the entrance.

2027 opening hours: Sunday 14 March, 10am to 6pm; Monday 15 March, 10am to 7pm; Tuesday 16 March, 10am to 4pm. Entry is free for trade visitors, with prior online registration. There is a restaurant, bar and tearoom on site; dogs on leads are welcome. For accommodation, the organiser refers visitors to the Biarritz Tourist Office.

What it costs to exhibit

Planning your visit

For exhibitors

• Book before 15 January 2027, the announced closing date, and choose early between a semi-equipped and an equipped stand: the difference is €99 on a 9 m² stand and €198 on an 18 m² stand.
• Aim for a corner position if the product needs demonstrating: the option costs €90 per extra aisle.
• Get involved in a competition or activity: the organiser offers partnership opportunities on the activities and competitions, which are the show's main traffic drivers.
• Plan targeted invitations from your own customer database: the show serves a local catchment area, and nearly one visitor in two attends no other trade show.

For visiting decision-makers

• Register online before coming to get your badge.
• Check the exhibitor list, due in November 2026, and prepare your comparisons: in 2025, ovens, refrigeration, tills and payment solutions were all represented.
• Choose your day according to the programme: in 2025, the mixology final and the waiters' race took place on Sunday, the baking competitions and the UMIH Pays Basque AGM on Monday, and contract catering and the croquembouche competition on Tuesday.
• Make the most of the timing: in March, ahead of the season, it's the time to renew equipment, suppliers and menus.

CSR policy & initiatives

The show has two concrete waste schemes. The association Les Glacières Solidaires collected the surplus food from the 2025 edition. The website also announces a collection of exhibitors' food waste by Les Alchimistes Pays Basque over the three days, presented as a way for trade visitors to comply with the AGEC law, applicable on this point since 1 January 2024, with the resulting compost going to farmers in the département.

Beyond these initiatives, neither the show nor Expomedia publishes a formal CSR policy, a carbon footprint for the event, or an ISO 20121 certification specific to the show. Expomedia describes itself as a member of UNIMEV, the events industry federation, which is not in itself an environmental commitment.

The venue, however, offers a documented guarantee. Destination Biarritz, which lists the Halle d'Iraty among its four event venues, states that all four sites it manages are ISO 20121 certified, with a successful follow-up audit in 2024, and that the destination secured renewal of the Destination Innovante Durable label, launched by France Congrès Événement, in 2026.

How the show has evolved

Trend analysis

Horesta was launched in 2015 in Biarritz, with 4,640 visitors announced for its first edition, and has since kept the same two-yearly rhythm, in March of odd-numbered years, and the same city; it has been held at the Halle d'Iraty since at least 2019. The sole exception is the 2021 edition: originally announced for 14-16 March, it was pushed back to 10-12 October, against the backdrop of the health crisis, before returning to the March calendar from 2023 onwards.

Recent growth is clear but needs to be read with the right unit. Between 2023 and 2025, unique visitors rose from 2,547 to 3,122, the 23% increase highlighted by the organiser; total attendance rose from 4,669 to 5,258, a gain of around 13%. Exhibitor numbers followed suit, from 145 to 150, on a stable floor area of 5,000 m². Figures prior to 2023 are not published with dates by the organiser, which rules out a longer read of the curve.

The positioning, though, has not changed: a local show, timed ahead of Easter and the start of the tourist season, which opened up to outdoor accommodation in 2021 and also welcomes leisure and contract catering, without straying from its home territory. For a national supplier, it is a way to reach, in three days, a clientele of independent traders across the Basque Country, Landes and Hautes-Pyrénées, nearly half of whom say they visit no other trade show.

The dates of the 2029 edition had not been announced at the time of writing.

All data not otherwise sourced comes from the organiser's website.

Unless otherwise stated, all factual data in this listing comes from the organiser's official website (horesta.fr).