Showtime - Munich Winter 06
ispo Winter goes big in Munich
Number 36 must be a lucky one for the people at ispo. As ASB goes to press the post-show chatter has been buzzing with adjectives little-heard in reference to the trade fair giant in recent years: ‘re-vamped’, ‘energetic’, ‘dynamic’ are all superlatives being given repeat air-play, with some industry execs overheard lamenting their early returns. (It appears while the four-day show may have been deemed too long in the past, this year the standard two-day trip left some newly hyped-honchos wanting.)
So what was the key to ispo success? Size had something to do with it – with 2006 the largest winter show in the fair’s history, late applicants found themselves booth-less and stammering. Visitor numbers, too, were record breaking: more than 60,000 people visited the show’s 1,806 exhibitors. But, as has been proven in the past, bigger does not always equate with better. It seems beyond the huge number of stalls and crammed corridors it was the energy emanating from the board sports arenas (four in all) that proved most powerful in ramping up the volume.
“Basically there are four things a trade show has to do to be successful,” explains ISPO boards community manager, Mick Wallace. “You’ve got to give retailers a market overview, you’ve got to give an information exchange, we have to give trends and we have to give some sort of emotional experience, a good party.”
If the number of empty beer bottles littering the halls by day one’s end were any indication then we can safely tick off the last, however the work Wallace has put in to establishing a broader market representation has also clearly had an impact in the show’s success across the board. From the little-known niche labels to the energy of the industry big-daddies and the excitement of the sport fashion visionaries, Munich provided the perfect platform from which to view all.
Seedbed – the showcase for a select group of international industry start-ups – brought good-tidings with a couple of funked-out apparel brands perhaps soon to be seen in a skate/surf/snow shop near you. Keep an eye out for Indonesia’s UDT (Berlin meets Bali), French skater Bruno Rouland’s street-influenced Logo?, and Swiss pro-snowboarder Romain de Marchi’s latest venture, QWST – urban wear straight from Switzerland.
A few steps up the rung, Aussie eyewear company Odyssey 20/20 attracted some positive attention as a finalist in the accessories division of ispo’s Brand New awards segment (beaten to top honours by German bag brand, Tubeline), while Quik’s latest acquisition, Rossignol, was meeting the high fashion standards of its neighbouring exhibitors in the ISPO Vision sport-style preview with its slim-line powder suits in bright Pucci-esque prints.
Colour also made an appearance in the winter clothing and technical outerwear of the main players, however more interesting was the clear trend toward English gent-inspired fashions: think subdued tweeds, plaids, palates of olive and camel, and the new-season cap – say goodbye trucker, and hello news-boy. The look will be familiar to all those who have been keeping an eye on the fashion catwalks the past few seasons. However it appears that the offerings of some brands have suffered slightly in the translation (note to Billabong and its showing of a trench coat-inspired snow jacket: great idea, slightly awkward execution.)
Womenswear, too, is continuing to go from strength-to-strength, with brands apparently recognising the lucrative market that awaits those willing to put the time and resources in to developing female-specific technology alongside apparel with a more obvious fashion focus.
But the biggest trend to come out of Munich this winter is clearly the explosion of electronics. What started with Burton’s 2004 iPod jacket, and continued with Oakley and its Thump technology, has now become something of an industry standard. From DC’s iPod backpack to O’Neill’s helmet cam and Rip Curl’s goggle cam, few companies are willing to leave the tech development segment of the market untouched. Of course some may say the real winner out of all this is Apple – with iPod having penetrated all, the company enjoyed the kind of high-profile exposure few brands could match. And all this without a stand.
As for the emotional experience, well, offering more than 7000 beers and plenty of beer halls in which to try them, Munich has never been a bad place to party. And it seems, this time, there really was something to celebrate.