Canadian Music Trade - February / March 2020 | Page 26

meet people who are
doing similar things
and try to pick their
brain. That’s always
been our goal. We go
down and say, ‘Let’s
learn what other
people are doing,’
and this year I would
say was a great year
for that. We walked
away with a whole
ton of ideas that,
quite frankly, would
not come to you if you were still stuck in
running the day-to-day grind of just keeping
the business going,” says Drysdale from
JamSchool. “Really, it’s people getting up and
telling you their trade secrets – the things that
have made them successful. There are things
that we’ve implemented at our school that we
learned there. It’s a big part of it for us.”
JEFF GUNN PERFORMING AT THE GODIN BOOTH
26 CANADIAN MUSIC TRADE
Among the exhibitors CMT chatted with on
Sunday to get a sense of their impressions,
the general feelings were very positive.
“I would rate it pretty highly. There
seemed to be a lot of traffic and good people
here – it didn’t seem like a lot of ‘tourists,’”
notes Luis Cardoso, marketing manager at
Sabian. “This year, we actually looked at it
a little bit differently. For us, it was more of
a marketing show instead of a sales show; it
was more about showing our stuff and we
had a suite for the few meetings we had and
I think it was quite successful.”
For Cole McBride, the founder of
Vancouver-based spring-loaded thumb pick
maker Black Mountain Picks, this was his first
time exhibiting at The NAMM Show, with
his booth located in the Innovator Showcase
in Hall E. To him, it was an unreserved suc-
cess. “It was 100 per cent worth it. Because it
was my first year, before the show you always
have those doubts about it and if it’s going
to pay for itself, but it 100 per cent did,”
he exclaims. “We opened up over 20 new
dealers and with the follow-up I imagine that
number is going to be over 50. We also got
some worldwide distribution, not to mention
all the media coverage we got, too.”
Meanwhile, Scott Kroeker, an assembly
technician at Manitoba’s Revv Amplifica-
tion, revealed that the company surpassed
its show goals. “Our goal was to sell our first
batch of G20s, which is the new amp that
we launched for 2020, and make some new
contacts for distribution and dealers around
the world. It’s been great; we’ve definitely
achieved that and we’re already selling into
our second batch of G20s. It’s incredible.”
Of course, opinions and impressions aren’t
universal. Almost everyone we chatted with
felt the show was a success for their company,
but while Cardoso at Sabian felt there weren’t
too many “tourists” wandering the show floor,
others said they definitely noticed an uptick in
end-users coming to their booths.
For example, Riversong Guitars Founder
Mike Miltimore, who has attended every
NAMM Show and Summer NAMM show
since 2013, says the show has been transform-
ing a lot in this regard. “We’re seeing a lot of
buyers and we’ve had a really good year for
that, but we’ve also seen a ton of consumers
and a lot of guests, as well. So, it’s turning
into more of an experience show,” he says,
adding that this evolution is a mixed blessing.
“The business side of me wants to have really
meaningful, good conversations in a quiet
show with distributors and dealers. But the
other side just loves talking about my guitars
to just about anybody who will listen!”
Miltimore’s feelings – that there are pros
and cons to a greater end-user presence –
were reflective of the majority of the exhibi-
tors with whom we spoke. But Mike Fortin,
founder of Whitby, ON-based Fortin Amps,
was a bit more critical. He was exhibiting at
NAMM for the second time with his own
company but has attended many past shows
with others. “It’s a lot different when you
have your own company and it’s a lot more
stressful, to say the least,” he laughs, but
emphasized that he wished the show was
more strictly limited to the trade because,
too often, he was trying to show his amps to
distributors and dealers and the product was
occupied by someone else.
But Fortin’s biggest issue this year was
the strictness of the “sound police.” There
were a lot of accounts of noise violation
warnings
around the
show floor,
and even a
couple booths
completely
shut down
on the last
couple days of
the show for