After Vegas...

From day one, World Market Center Co-Managing Partner Shawn Samson has insisted the furniture show his group was planning was not aimed at High Point, San Francisco, Tupelo or any other domestic market.

Instead, Samson and his cohort Jack Kashani had their sights set on a larger target. The tipoff, all along, was in the name of the building(s) they would erect to house their show: World Market Center.

Samson continued to stress in every conversation we had that the WMC was going to bring a world-class show with an international scope to Las Vegas, a city associated with things over the top.

As I write this on day four of the inaugural furniture show, I believe the WMC did a number of noteworthy things:

* They gave the industry its very own Field of Dreams. They built it, and the industry came.

* They re-energized an industry that needed a reason to feel good about itself.

* Even more critically, exhibitors said the show attracted buyers they hadn’t seen at any furniture show in the past three years.

Maybe it was a mix of the excitement of Vegas coupled with a brand new building, but whatever it was, exhibitors and retailers were more upbeat than I have ever seen them. The talk of the show was of traffic (massive), attitude (incredibly positive) and opportunities (suddenly unlimited).

I heard none of the usual comments about soft business. The only time the word “soft” came up was to refer to rapidly melting ice cream cones that, like the rest of us, were wilting in the 100-degree heat.

Whether or not it intended to — you, my friend, can make that call — this market almost forces us to consider what Vegas could mean to the Tupelo and High Point markets.

I am a firm believer that, in business, we don’t lose customers so much as we give them away through neglect, or let them slip through our fingers through indifference.

I’m not smart enough to predict the outcome. But, writing from the desert, I’ll say this: Intentionally or not, a line has been drawn in the sand.  (to add public comments click on "Add your Comment" below, or to email Ray directly click here.)