Thoughts On NAB
Well, we’re back from Vegas. We actually got back late Friday night, but this is the first chance I’ve had to sit down and write anything. Those first few days back from a week out of the office are always a chaotic whirlwind of catch-up.
First off I wanna say that it was a blast! We had such a great time; met a lot of cool people. Most importantly, we got the chance to show off The Vault to a whole set of people who weren’t familiar with it. That’s always fun for us because we really love our music.
Attendance was down this year; 83,842, compared to 105,259 attendees in 2008, and the traffic was a little slower than we expected. But those who came by the booth were really interested in what we had to offer. I talked with several vendors, and the following from Broadcasting & Cable seems well in line with what everyone was saying:
Vendors B&C spoke with this week on the exhibit floor estimated the actual attendance to be even lower, perhaps 60,000, particularly when looking at barometers like short or non-existent cab lines at local hotels and the ease of securing reservations at top restaurants. While large vendors with prime floor positions like Harris, Sony and Avid (which returned to the show this year) were enjoying full booths, some of the hallways and booths on the periphery of the show floor were unusually quiet.
…
[Ricardo Flores, director of broadcast sales for satellite service provider GlobeCast] and other exhibitors, however, said that the quality of the traffic at this year’s show was excellent, as many lower-level employees didn’t make the trip this year. Instead of waves of “tire-kickers,” the broadcasters who were hitting the booths were senior executives with purchasing power.
Del Parks, VP of engineering and operations for Sinclair Broadcast Group, said he had met with one large vendor at the show Tuesday afternoon who had just earned two purchase orders.
“The people who came are buying,” said Parks.
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So I really think it was a good show. And it was tons of fun getting to give away those great guitars. We got to make several people very happy. What more could you ask for?