[OriginalOscar]

Downtown this week it was great to see Outdoor Retailer back in Utah. Talking with the people attending they are thrilled to be back in Salt Lake. Great snow this year was appreciated; thank you Mother Nature.

 

[Vanilla]

Someone on this forum knew they’d come crawling back…

 

[NativeCutt]

Please come to Salt Lake for the Springtime
I'm stayin' here with some friends and they've got lotsa room
You can sell your outdoor products on the sidewalk
By a café where I hope to be workin' soon
Please come to Salt Lake
They said "No-would you come home to me?"
And Salt Lake said, "hey ramblin' boy now wontcha settle down?"
"Denver ain't your kinda town"
"There ain't no gold and there ain't nobody like me"
"I'm the number one fan of the man from Salt Lake City"
Please come to Denver with the snowfall
We'll move up into the mountains so far that we can't be found
And throw "I love you" echoes down the canyon
And then lie awake at night till they come back around
Please come to Denver
They said "No-boy, would you come home to Salt Lake City?"

 

[JerryH]

It took me a minute to figure out what song

 

[bthewilde]

Do you think I could get into OR with the same retailer that I've used for SHOT Show? I am not going to Shot this year, but have never thought about OR. Might be fun since it's in my backyard!

 

[middlefork]

If the retailer is registered and submits your name. No problem except you might be a little late to the party until the next show.

 

[OriginalOscar]

Do you think I could get into OR with the same retailer that I've used for SHOT Show? I am not going to Shot this year, but have never thought about OR. Might be fun since it's in my backyard!

Word on the street is OR is planning public days in the future. Stay tuned!

 

[backcountry]

Huh, why would they do public days? Sincerely curious as the intent of the event has been educating retailers about new lines and ultimately driving sales orders. Will be curious to hear more about that and what it means for the event structure.

 

[PHall]

It would be a revenue generator for the OR show itself, brands might do limited sales/special runs/limited offers for their new products, but it wouldn't be an overall detriment to sales orders and retail sales at full pop for new products. These days in retail, most retailers already have look books/new product lines/etc prior to OR. Your big players in outdoor retail aren't going to OR to see their existing brand partners new products, but going to check on smaller brands/new prospects/etc.

 

[middlefork]

They have talked about opening it up for years. A retail buyer may look at 20 different offerings from a company and only buy one or two. A consumer relying on a retail shop to showcase any manufacture's complete line is really missing out. That is also why a lot of companies have gone direct to consumer through web sites.

The expense for an exhibitor is renting the space and being available to talk to retailers for X ammount of days. Not much added expense to stay open another day or two for the public. Pretty hard to do both at the same time as it becomes too crowded.

 

[backcountry]

Would be interesting to see how it would play out if they go that direction. Funny to consider it given how much energy OR has put into refining qualifications for participants over the last decade. They've gotten really explicit in the last few years as the internet and "influencers" capture more bandwidth for the industry.

Not sure I'd want to actually pay to go in and compete for rep attention with the general public myself. Paying an entrance fee to see gear I still have to pay for isn't exactly in my budget. But I bet the likely target audience would love to pay the fee to be the first to have the newest gear. I have no problem with gear manufacturers cashing in on that gravy train.

*Ugh, just realized that most of my friends who went professionally in the past have aged out from it through retirement, etc. Not even sure I know many folks left in the industry actually 😬. Time flies.