“While no one is predicting a quick turnaround, our Members who attended NAMM seized the high ground of the highly anticipated recovery,” notes NAMM CEO Joe Lamond, and his thoughts are echoed by many of the exhibitors whom we spoke with in Anaheim.
Despite the challenges related to the worldwide economic crisis, the 30th annual Musikmesse and ProLight & Sound show in Frankfurt, Germany showed surprising resiliency. The gathering is the largest convention of musical instrument and audio/lighting companies in the world and, although the number of exhibitors was slightly down from last year, this year’s show still featured an extraordinary list of companies, with 1,560 exhibitors at the Musikmesse and 850 at the ProLight & Sound show, representing 47 countries. The U.S. fielded 46 companies at the ProLight & Sound show and 132 at the Musikmesse. Attendance figures from the Messe management indicated approximately 111,000 visitors, a slight increase over last year’s attendance, although the attendance from people outside of Germany was down by 3.5 percent. Some U.S. exhibitors suggested that attendance from American dealers was down significantly. The best represented visitor nations after Germany were The Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, France, Italy, Austria, Great Britain, Poland, Sweden, Spain, and the Czech Republic. The most non-European visitors came from the U.S.A., South Korea, the People’s Republic of China, and Japan.
