by We’ve all heard the phrase, “Blink and you’ll miss it.”
For me, that truly summed up the recent High Point furniture market and here’s why.
Buyers were out in force on Monday. Let me clarify that. The Monday I am referring to was not the Monday following Saturday’s opening day. It was the Monday prior to Saturday’s opening day.
And while buyers shopping early is hardly news, scores of exhibitors told me they could not recall a market where buyers were that early.
And frankly, while those exhibitors were reluctant to share their unhappiness about that with customers, they were far more open with me. One large exhibitor said, “Imagine you are hosting a dinner party and you ask your guests to arrive by 7 p.m. How would you feel if they showed up hours earlier and you are nowhere near ready to welcome them to your home?” he asked.
I think we all get his point. You want your home, or in this case, your showroom, to be ready, and when your guests come hours early, you just are not able to set the stage the way you would like.
Another large case goods exhibitor said, “When that happens, I feel as if I am at a disadvantage. Not only that, I feel like I’ve lost my opportunity to have my customers see my presentations the way we want to show them,” he added.
Another ongoing trend that added to the blink-and-miss phenomena at this market involved the time key buyers spent here shopping. A large upholstery exhibitor told me that the majority of her key customers were on their way home by the time the show officially opened on Saturday.
The third major trend, and sadly, also ongoing, was the trend to send fewer buyers to market.
A decorative accessories exhibitor said that the impact of those three market drivers “made it feel like a one-and-one-half-day event.”
This exhibitor, who also shows at a number of the foreign trade fairs, said she wished the High Point Market could be more like the foreign trade shows. “Over there, they open the doors at 9 a.m. and close them at 5 p.m., no exceptions,” she said.
“Nobody gets in early or stays late and that creates a groundswell and concentration of buyers, which creates a heady sense of energy, urgency and excitement,” she added.
To be fair, those fairs are better able to control more rigid opening and closing times because unlike High Point, they don’t have some 180 different buildings, more than 2,000 exhibitors or some 11,500,000 total square feet of showroom space.
Also, since a good portion of the showroom buildings are privately owned, it is impossible to mandate opening and closing bells at market.
But even with an early start, shorter shopping trips and fewer buyers, the market once again served to bring buyers and sellers together to network, strategize, buy and sell and, most importantly, plan for the future.
On the basis of all of those things, the market once again met its objective.
And as always, my hat is off to the High Point Market Authority for an ability to make a daunting task look easy.
While the dynamics of this market may have changed, one thing never does. The exhibitors who invest to bring the right products, the right promotions, the right support and the right messaging to market come out on top regardless of when market opens and closes.
