Twenty years ago the music industry in China was too small to warrant a world-class trade fair to showcase our products. But things are really moving fast in that part of the world and it starts as soon as you land at the Shanghai airport. The train going into the business area floats on a reverse magnetic field and you’re soon barreling toward the Fair, a few inches off the tracks at speeds well in the excess of 250 miles per hour!!!
When you arrive at the Shanghai Music Fair a few minutes later (the fair took place this year from October 14-17) the fun really begins. This Fair has now become the largest Musical Instrument Show in the world, dwarfing the NAMM Shows and the Frankfurt Musikmesse. It is also the noisiest and most amazing display of musical product anywhere on earth.
Are these International Shows important to you? That is a question that you will have to answer for yourself, but you should know that many of your competitors are there, especially the larger retailers in the country. So if you are interested in growing your business it might be worth your while to expand your horizons. Looking back a few years, I went to the Frankfurt Music Fair for the first time when I was lord and master of a 900 square foot retail music shop. Should I have been there? …maybe not, but I thought that even one good idea or product discovery at a show like that would more than cover all of the expenses incurred, and I still believe that.
We exhibit at every one of those fairs and we look forward to the face-to-face meetings with our business partners there. We’ll see you very soon out here in Sunny California at the Winter NAMM Show in Anaheim. It may not be the biggest but it may be the best—especially when it’s snowing in Sault Ste. Marie!
Richard Keldsen
San Francisco
November 2015