Fall Preview and Cautious Shopping at Long Beach ASR

Fears of hard economic times to come, perceived less traffic and the reality of MAGIC International’s larger show next week all contributed to the unique varied mood at the Feb. 3–5 run of the Action Sports Retailer Trade Expo (ASR) at the Long Beach Convention Center in Long Beach, Calif.

Buyer attendance was up by about 150 to 7,422 over the year prior. Overall attendance numbers totaled 18,419, this year was up about eight or nine hundred more, according to Court Overin, general manager, for Laguna Beach, Calif.-based VNU Expositions, ASR’s parent company.

But some exhibitors on the show floor said they thought attendance was far less than in previous years.

“This is by far the slowest show I’ve done in the last eight years I’ve done this show. Buyer traffic is definitely down,” said Alex Berenson, president of Los Angeles-based Kik Wear Industries.

Berenson said he couldn’t pinpoint a reason why energy has been decreasing for the past few [ASR] shows, but said he believed news of a slowing economy was at fault.

Kenny Gandolto, of Irvine, Calif.-based GDK Sales, agreed.

“Although it really hasn’t happened yet, the fear of the economy slowing down is making people buy more cautiously,” he said. “No one is buying recklessly.”

But Overin said he didn’t see any signs of a slowdown, in fact, quite the opposite.

According to Overin, the reason several exhibiting companies dropped to 515 from last year’s 600 is because “the bigger guys are getting bigger and expanding their categories and brands, thus reducing the overall amount of available exhibitor space—an overall sign of a steady economy.”

Overin also noted that in times of economic recession, large companies start pulling the plug on smaller categories and brands; and larger players such as Quiksilver and Globe Shoes—active sportswear companies that launch different category offshoots—command a larger portion of the main show floor.

“We’ve made the decision to accommodate these long-standing customers first,” added Overin.

This year’s strategy of distributing fewer exhibitor guest passes—to have a crowd made up with “less kids and more buyers”—may have been mistaken for slowed traffic, Overin said.

Waiting for a Little MAGIC

Some exhibitors noticed that many buyers skipped the Spring/ Summer collections on display but stayed for a preview of Fall merchandise, which will make its official debut at next week’s MAGIC show.

“In some ways, this show has become a preview to MAGIC,” said Kik Wear’s Berenson.

Greg Henley, sales manager at Pornstar in Santa Barbara, Calif. said he waited to break his Fall merchandise at MAGIC because “there are a lot more customers there.”

Other exhibitors said they thought some buyers were skipping the show entirely, opting instead to attend MAGIC.

Sue Eklof, director of Placentia, Calif.-based beach lifestyle apparel manufacturer White Lies, said she didn’t think “buyers are going to spend the money to go to all the shows—-they’re either going to buy here, or they’re going to wait for MAGIC.”

Eklof also credited the “slower” turnout on the apparel side of the show to the influx of hard goods into the show.

“There used to be much more apparel,” she said.

Porn-Inspired Promotion

Rob “Moe” Sim, “international sales pimp” for Costa Mesa-based eyewear company Black Flys, said despite the large number of onlookers (via peep holes on either side of his enclosed booth) for his company’s S&M-inspired show featuring strippers and a go-go pole, he saw the show getting “slower and slower every year.”

Such crowd-drawing hype has contributed to ASR becoming “much more of a PR show” and not the “writing show it used to be,” according to Berenson.

But it wasn’t all hype and no business for Suzanne Blumer, general sales, for Carpinteria, Calif.-based eyewear manufacturer Blue Gem Sunglasses.

“I think it used to be much more promotional and not as big a writing show,” she said. “But we wrote a lot this year.”

Still, a familiar-to-ASR refrain echoed throughout the show floor: ASR’s attendance included more kids than buyers. Kathy Merrick, CEO and designer for the new Ventura, Calif.-based junior surf apparel company Surf Chick, said she didn’t see the “foot traffic as populated with retailers as with the scene,” adding that the show didn’t “seem as busy as the past.”

Business was “very slow” for swimwear exhibitor Ron Solomons, national sales manager for Los Angeles-based Jennifer K. Inc., which produces the California Waves, Endless Sun and Sizzle Beach swim labels.

Solomons was one of several swim exhibitors who had no new merchandise to show. He said the handful of swim companies in attendance were there “more for promotion, just to be seen and show you’re in the marketplace for later buying.”

Buyers’ Mood Buoyant

But complaints of slow traffic didn’t seem to affect retailers’ moods, which remained positive overall.

Scott Hullguen, owner of San Marcos, Calif.-based skate shop State said he was at ASR—which he calls the “best of its kind”—to buy mostly men’s clothing in paired-down, cleaned-up looks, echoing the trends in skate and surf apparel many observed at last month’s Surf Expo show in Orlando, Fla.

International buyers, primarily from Japan, South America and Canada, also turned out for the show.

Venezuelan retailer Oswaldo Acosta said Internet-aided globalization kept South American buying trends up-to-date with the United States—rather than the several months’ lag time the retailer said he saw in the pre-Internet days.

“Things are getting simpler and simpler design-wise,” said the owner of the six Caracas-based Aero Skate & Surf shops. “Streetwear and the whole urban thing is also getting really big there [Venezuela].”

Rayne Frey, a buyer for San Clemente, Calif.-based Stewart Surfboards, said the show was a “lot of fun” and made “loads of connections,” but also said she almost got hit in the head with a skateboard at the show’s vert ramp demo—a feature the retailer noted she really “digged.”

Frey said she saw lots of trends, such as punk and ’70s themes, continuing.

Punk Details and Baby Surf

Jim Duval, head designer for Irvine, Calif.-based apparel manufacturer Suburban, sees fashion going in a “Polo Punk” direction.

“Think of clean designs, such as an Oxford-style shirt with a punky twist,” he said.

Other trends in surf apparel, skate apparel, streetwear and beach-lifestyle apparel going into Fall were:

bull; More dresses and skirts bull; More textured fabrics for bottoms bull; Knits bull; Constructed denim bull; Velcro buttons bull; Flashy things, “shiny things”

Robert Hurley, president of Hurley International in Costa Mesa, Calif., said his company is preparing for what he views as a growing niche within the surf and skate apparel industry for kids and tweens.

“I’ve gotten so many people asking for it,” he said.

Hurley said his company, which already manufactures apparel for boys, has two new brands in the works to debut a year from now: Early Hurley for “real little kids,” meaning toddlers, and Little Girlie for the tween girl customer.

Hurley added that the brands will be made up of “miniatures” of the adult lines, and promised they’d be “really cute.”