SHOT Show 2021 Cancelled

[Silent H]

Today the NSSF announced that SHOT Show 2021 has been cancelled due to the ongoing pandemic.

We've seen some changes to the knife industry because of the pandemic, but I think this might be one of the biggest. As a fan and collector of production knives, I always looked forward to seeing the new announcements at SHOT show. Even though I could never go to SHOT, it was nice seeing the coverage of new products from knife related media and retailers such as Blade HQ's youtube channel.

Many companies base their new product announcement and advertising calendars around SHOT, and are now probably scrambling to come up with new ways and places to announce and display their new products. I couldn't even imagine the impact this is going to have on the distributors, wholesalers, and retailers as well, since so many deals are made at SHOT. Besides the changes manufacturer's already had to make to their production schedules and supply chains, I think this will have a huge impact on the production knife world next year.

Then again, It might be nice to see more companies release new products throughout the year, like Spyderco has started doing, instead of announcing all their new products at once.

 

[Insipid Moniker]

That's a real shame, but I think they're making the right call. Hopefully, we'll still get some new product announcements around that time.

 

[eisman]

Well, I was kind of hoping to go this coming year. I've got 6 weeks vacation to burn or lose...

The major change is going to be in the marketing. Advertising via print has been failing for years, and most gun and knife (and hunting, et al) manufacturers are restricted in what forms of electronic media and venues are open to them. When you have major IT driven company cultures like Amazon, eBay, and Facebook closed off due to corporate cultures that are liberal or Socialist, or are in fear of lawfare that takes away their revenue, you're going to have to get creative in reaching out to core customers. Magazine subscriptions are down, most major media won't take "sporting" advertising for fear of "upsetting" a vocal minority, and radio and TV are expensive and reaching fewer people each year. It's a long time since companies like Abercrombie and Fitch actually supported outdoorsmen, and longer since they advertised in the WSJ. That's not coming back. Think about it, where do you see gun and knife advertising?

What does it matter if Spyderco puts out a new product if 80% of the guys who might buy a knife don't know about it? They're not going to see it on the shelf anywhere unless they're incredibly lucky. New products that are not picked up by the remaining prime vendors (those who do $100,000,000/yr) are probably doomed.

I used to have to write $500,000 in sales at SHOT to make it worthwhile for our small company to justify the expense of going. Offsetting the lack of expense when there's no show is the inability of reaching customers in a less expensive and just as profitable manner. One of the reasons SHOT was always restricted to "industry" personnel is the tiered distribution system and incredibly short time to make sales was compromised by "lookie loons". (If I take time to talk to Joe Snuffy, who might buy one of my products, I've doubled the amount of sales I have to make to the guys who'll buy in bulk.)

Now that the marketing is more and more focused on direct sales the tiered distribution system, and inventory systems related to that model, are going to have to adjust. This is going to impact jobs all the way up and down the chain. It's my opinion that there are other industries in the same boat, the automobile and liquor industries come immediately to mind, although their distribution model is protected by laws (which are quickly becoming obsolete with new technologies.)

 

[marcus52AR]

Ah man thays shotty. Go away covid.

 

[Owen K.]

Thats a shame. I was looking forward to making time to go, since we missed 2020. Missing the media coverage will suck too. Hopefully it will be bigger and better in 2022.

Edit: As a thought, should we make a thread so people can post new models and such that they see pop up over the next year? Be it members or manufacturers.

 

[Ben Dover]

The right call. But still a shame.

I had the opportunity to attend SHOT several years ago and it was, as the younger generartion would say " like totally awesome, man!"

 

[Stickgunner]

My understanding was that SHOT was making companies pay regardless of if they attended or not, if they didn't pay, they lost their seniority spot. There must have been a lot of backlash for them to eat the bill and let that go.