The event was founded as the
American Booksellers Association Convention and Trade Show in 1947 and continued under this name until 1994, when
Reed Exhibitions purchased a 49% share of the event. The following year, 1995, Reed took 100% control and renamed the convention BookExpo America. From its beginning until 1970, it was held in Washington, D.C. In the 1990s and early 2000s, BEA was often held in
Chicago. BEA was held in
Washington, D.C. in 2006, in
New York City in 2007, and in
Los Angeles in 2008. BEA was held at the
Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York City from 2009 through 2015. BEA returned to
Chicago in 2016. The 2015 book fair featured
Chinese publishers for the first time. For a time, DigiCon from the International Digital Publishing Forum (IDPF) ran concurrently with BEA. However, the IDPF was absorbed into the
W3C in 2017; no further DigiCon events have been announced, though the W3C holds other conferences on digital publishing. The 2020 edition was initially delayed from May 2020 to July 2020 due to the
COVID-19 pandemic, but was later canceled. In December 2020, Reed Exhibitions announced that BookExpo America and sister events BookCon and Unbound would be "retired" indefinitely in order to "explore new ways to meet the community's needs through a fusion of in-person and virtual events." ==See also==