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Interbike '05: Inside the hall, a Day 1 photo gallery
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Interbike’s International Expo opened Tuesday, with more than 10,000 attendees swarming in among next season’s bikes on the red carpets of the Sands Convention Center in Las Vegas. After two dusty days of testing product at the Outdoor Demo in nearby Bootleg Canyon, the show moved indoors to get down to business.
More than 10,000 buyers for about 3500 bike shops have registered to check out the 2006 wares that some 750 companies — representing more than 1000 brands— have on display. The business they do here determines what will be cropping up in your local shop in the coming months.
That said, many shop buyers have much of next year’s product locked in before boarding the plane to Las Vegas. Larger companies, such as Trek and Specialized, have already shown their new goodies at dealer weekends — often held near company headquarters — and are banging out terms and pricing with retailers. Many smaller companies have shown their lines to retailers through sales reps. So why do retailers come to Interbike? For many of the same reasons that bring you into a bike shop: to check out what’s new, compare them to what you have, perhaps buy something, maybe learn something, and hopefully bump into some old friends.
“Interbike is not just about seeing product,” said Interbike show director Lance Camisasca. “It’s about shaking hands, learning about bike advocacy, seeing celebrities, taking tech seminars and seeing friends.”
Just as riders frequent shops for tools and advice to improve their cycling, retailers come to Interbike to improve their shop’s performance, shopping for everything from bike fitting equipment to the latest information on overhauling downhill forks.
Another possible similarity to your local bike shop? The post-work beer. As each of the show’s three day’s winds to a close, numerous companies break out cold ones for their customers. Many companies turn on the style with after-hours parties at various casinos. For years, Kona has hosted an IMBA bowling “Fun-Raiser,” where Interbike goers knock back plenty of pins and beers in the name of supporting the non-profit organization.
But at the core, it is about the bike. The night before the Expo opened, company employees feverishly worked like elves, building hundreds of bikes to display in the massive convention center hall. So many such elves came to the Pedro’s booth desperately asking for Bike Lust polish to buff up their bikes that Pedro’s marketing manager Karl Wiedemann eventually gave up and set out multiple large bottles.
As the final major trade show on the calendar — following Eurobike in Friedrichshafen and EICMA in Milan — Interbike is the last chance for companies to launch next year’s products on an international stage. Here are a few goodies of 2006.
