Last year, SHOT Show quietly eased into the archery segment. In 2024, the presence will get a boost.

The collaboration with Grand View Outdoors will expand from the eight early exhibitors of 2023 to any manufacturer of outdoor, hunting, archery and crossbow products caring to exhibit when SHOT 2024 convenes January 23-26, 2024 in Las Vegas.

No, the offer isn’t for free space; it’s for space in the archery pavilion.

But as companies sitting on the long waiting list for SHOT can attest, any opportunity to get before the massive crowd of attendees is worth consideration.

Photos: OWDN

SHOT Show brings thousands of industry types to Las Vegas each January (above). ATA’s considerably smaller event brings together core companies of archery to share information (below) and look for the hottest new archery-focused products in the coming year.

Located in the Caesar’s Forum’s Academy Ballroom, the Archery Pavilion is one of the few first-come, first-served spaces at SHOT. After 2024, prior exhibitors will have first dibs on space.

As a part of the partnership, I’m told by Grandview Outdoors President Derrick Nawrocki their Archery Business team will be located there as well, and they’ll be “working on best ways to cover and promote companies that exhibit.” There will also be coverage of archery in the SHOT Daily and other trade pubs, including Hunting Retailer, and Shooting Sports Retailer. Yes, we’ll also be checking things out there for the Archery Wire.

NSSF’s Senior Vice President and Chief Customer Officer Chris Dolnack tells me there are already a number of new companies committed. They include Victory Archery, Summit Outdoors, Otter Technologies, and Pure Archery Group. Pure’s attendance means BowTech, Excalibur, Diamond, TightSpot, Ripcord, Black Gold and Octane brands will be represented. And Summit’s five niche brands are well-known when it comes to hunting blinds.

As consolidation has taken hold in archery, it’s increasingly resembling the fishing business, where a few large corporations owning a number of “name” brands.

The NSSF/SHOT decision to look into the archery segment is reminiscent the decision to include AR-style rifles into the Shooting, Hunting and Outdoor Trades. In those early years, tactical products were in a very modest area. Today, the tactical segment sprawls across an impressive amount of floor space inside its own dedicated ballrooms.

Archery, according Dolnack, represents a viable potential expansion category for “twenty-five percent of our buyers. Just shy of 5,000 of them say they’re interested in archery and bowhunting products.”

By any measure, that’s a very large number of potential customers. Especially if a significant number of them likely represent new customers.

New customers are not all that plentiful if you’re an archery manufacturer. If you’re a retailer, new customers in any category represent potential sales across a variety of your hunting related lines. Win-win, right?

Not necessarily.

One unanswered question remains: will archery companies dip their toes into the new SHOT marketplace?

Several archery-focused companies don’t attend their segment’s biggest shot, the ATA Show. ATA has traditionally kicked off the major trade-show marathon each year. In 2024, it will do that again, convening January 11-13 in St. Louis, Missouri.

I’ve spoken with representatives for several archery companies, and while they tell me they’re “considering” SHOT, they’re still on the fence regarding “the SHOT opportunity.”

I’ve also asked a more direct question: is this an “either/or” decision?

If they choose SHOT, will they pass on ATA, or are they considering both?

One executive told me that for smaller companies, cost could certainly be a consideration.

“SHOT Show exhibit space is twice as expensive as our traditional ATA space,” he explained, “and there’s no question that transport will be more expensive. Many of the small companies drive company vehicles to St. Louis or Indianapolis (a longtime ATA host) to exhibit -and save the shipping costs. That’s not an option to Las Vegas. Plus, ATA’s a three day show; SHOT’s four days -plus the erection/teardown time and drayage associated with Las Vegas.”

Drayage, if you’re not familiar with it, is the handling charges that are billed to exhibitors at trade shows. Las Vegas isn’t known for being a bargain when it comes to drayage.

The single question they all have to answer appears pretty simple: is SHOT worth the cost?

The answer is certainly more complicated than it might appear.

Without a doubt, SHOT Show is considerably more expensive than ATA.

But, I asked, is the cost offset by the potential for as many as 5,000 new customers?

“That’s a tough one,” was one response. “New customers are valuable, but can archery companies bring in enough traffic at SHOT with all the other stuff buyers are trying to see to bring in the new business to cover those costs? I can’t answer that with any confidence.”

That, I’m told by Grandview’s Nawrocki, is where their part of the SHOT partnership comes in. “We’re working to solidify the Pavilion and believe we’ll have plenty of opportunities for interested buyers.”

According to Nawrocki, there will be plenty of variety in products for buyers, in addition to Grandview editors and photographers working the pavilion for content that will go into the daily Shot Business editions and subsequent editions of Grandview’s respective archery and outdoor business titles post-SHOT.

The archery media will be attending ATA as well. But potential exposure to new media outlets, influencers, podcasters and the other media types will certainly smaller, albeit more focused, at ATA than SHOT. SHOT Show 2023, for example, credentialed two thousand media. Granted, only a fraction of 2024’s media will be interested in archery, but it’s still a part of the value proposition archery manufacturers will have to weigh before deciding.

I asked ATA President and CEO Jeff Poole if he considered the SHOT expansion a direct threat to the ATA Show.

“Absolutely not,” he said, “we’re the trade group focused exclusively on archery, and SHOT covers virtually every aspect of shooting, hunting and the outdoors.”

Poole went on to tell me, ATA isn’t opposed to the SHOT expansion, saying, “If it’s good for our members, we’d support it as a ‘dual opportunity’ for archery companies.” That led me to ask if that “support” would go as far as ATA considering participating in the Archery Pavilion at SHOT. That, Poole told me, was definitely something that “might get some consideration.”

For all of us costs for virtually everything have continued to rise throughout 2023, although a bit more slowly than last year. As a result, there’s been the expected and commensurate impact on the sales of outdoor goods. Across the board, sales are, at best, flat. Most companies are only reporting increases in inventories. That’s not good news.

It’s now obvious that sales driven by pandemic lockdowns are now history. In categories ranging from camping equipment to ammunition, retailers are looking at inventory that’s no longer flying off shelves. If that’s something you doubt, look at the return of the summer markdowns and incentives designed to help retailers, distributors and manufacturers move excess inventory.

As manufacturers, wholesalers, distributors and retailers go into 2024, they’re looking at what is a very uncertain economic situation. Consequently, they’re considering every opportunity to expand their universe. At the same time, they’re also weighing -carefully- every associated cost.

As always, we’ll keep you posted.

— Jim Shepherd