From my Day 3 Blog intro:
"Can you say "slow show" three times quickly? Attendance at this year's CES and The Show by manufacturers and consumers, etc. alike was down to levels I've never seen in all my years of attending the Winter Show. For example, just two years ago, high-end aka Specialty Audio occupied four flours of the Venetian Hotel and two floors of upstairs suites. This year? Basically 1 2/3rds floors of the Venetian plus two floors of suites. An identical downturn was observed at The Show that went from two upstairs and one downstairs floor just last year to just one upstairs and one downstairs floor. The reasons? It's not totally clear but some feel that it's economics. There's no argument that exhibiting at CES is a an extremely expensive proposition. One can also couple cost concerns with the burgeoning number of shows not only in the US—or even North America—but all around the world. And the reason that these shows are cropping up around the world is that is where the high-end equipment market is strongest. Russia. China. Asia. The Middle East. Even places that one would not think of such as Vietnam. Others claim that the Munich Show is and has been slowly chipping away for quite some time at the Winter CES Show's hegemony (many distributors prefer to meet their US suppliers now at the Munich Show for multiple reasons). Yet others feel the downturn in attendance is directly attributable to the show having been moved to four weekdays instead of two weekdays and and the weekend. And the bad weather certainly also proved a barrier for many to attend. Several manufacturers arrived late because of missed/cancelled flights and even pieces of equipment suffered the same fate. Whatever the reason, it will be interesting to see if CES notes this downturn—or even cares—since Specialty Audio is a minuscule part of the show."
