“The show has been great. We have been packed like crazy since the show opened or even actually a little beforehand,” said Kristina Hodgson of Shure. “Lots of great questions, lots of people being interested in our product, trying things out. It’s been a great show.
“We have a lot of old friends stopping by and filling out orders, so it’s been a really great sales show for us, and then a lot of new connections as well, so hopefully towards the future we’ll get some more good business. We’ve got a lot of artist signings and they’ve been amazingly popular. Very good show for us and definitely NAMM is busier than many of us remember in lots of years.”
“Roland was very pleased with the results of the NAMM Show,” said Dennis Houilhan, president of Roland Corp. US. “There was a definite positive attitude from retailers and a genuine optimism for a better 2010 ahead. The response to all our new products and technologies was strong. NAMM’s theme was “Get Ready!” Dealers were ready to buy and get 2010 off to a strong start.”
“The show’s been going good,” said Jason Lee of Everly Music, North Hollywood, CA. “We have a lot of meetings with everybody. This show seems to be a lot more exciting than last year. I think it’s on the up-and-up with the economy, and we have a lot of new products out so it’s going good. It’s where we’re going to introduce a lot of the new strings, a lot of the new designs. We go to a lot of meetings at night, but we were out at a show last night, it was fun to see old friends.”
“It’s going fantastic,” said Don Harrington of Rhythm Ring, San Diego. “We’ve got great feedback, great response, made some good relationships. It’s our first year here, so we’re doing pretty well. We did a little social media marketing to pump it up a little bit, but it’s just first-time attendees and we’re doing really great.”
“It’s going very well,” said Andrew Naumann of Schilke Music Products, Melrose Park, IL. “I think this year’s very positive. It’s fantastic for us. Everyone seemed very upbeat and that was nice to see.”
Retailers at the NAMM Show were also quite enthusiastic about what they were seeing.
“Business has been very good,” said Brian Marsh with idjnow, a pro audio, lighting and video company. “It’s been a very progressive show so far. A lot of manufacturers are coming out with a lot of innovative new products. For us Numark happens to be one of the ones that is standing out.”
Dow Ferguson, owner of a brand new online music store thelutherie.net, said the last time he came to the NAMM Show was in 1973 when it was in San Francisco. Now he is looking for companies who will ship product directly to his new online customers.
“I wanted to tie down some string companies that will drop ship them to save costs and make it easier for me and for the customer,” Ferguson said.
“My business has been good so far at the show,” said Kevin Kuptz of Ingnited Light and Sound. “We’ve been able to pick up a couple of new lines of pro audio equipment and we’ve had more business and less extra people around.”
The next NAMM trade is Summer NAMM, which will be held June 18-20, 2010 in Nashville.