Trucking Showdown Pits Vegas Against Anaheim

A Tradeshow Week 200 show's sponsoring association and longtime manager disagree about the best way to revitalize the event. A dispute, centering on the best location for the show, ensues. The association and manager part ways and produce competing shows. And, of course, there's a lawsuit.

Sound familiar?

This time around, however, it's trucks, not hardware. The California Trucking Assn. is moving its 42-year-old Intl. Trucking Show back to the Anaheim Convention Center Sept. 23-25, after eight years in Las Vegas. And Independent Trade Show Management, the show's organizer of 40 years, is launching a competing event, The Truck Show Las Vegas, June 10-12 at the Las Vegas Convention Center.

The crux of the friction seems to be location. The Intl. Trucking Show started in San Francisco in 1961, began rotating between Anaheim and San Francisco in 1969, went to Anaheim exclusively in 1986 and moved to Las Vegas in 1996. The show did well its first years in Las Vegas – so well, in fact, that it outgrew the Sands Expo & Convention Center and moved to the Las Vegas Convention Center in 1999.

According to Tradeshow Week research, size-wise the show peaked in 1997, placing 99th in the TSW 200 with 267,660 net square feet, 663 exhibiting companies and 20,917 professional attendees. By 2001, it had dropped to No. 155 on the top-200 list, with 177,480 net square feet, 572 exhibitors and 17,654 attendees.

According to Joel Anderson, CTA executive vice president and CEO, the "blush of newness" of Las Vegas wore off.

He claims the association conducted research demonstrating that what exhibitors really wanted was qualified buyers and, because Southern California has become such an important pickup and distribution area for truckers, that's where the qualified buyers are.

But, he said, that's not the only reason for the move to Anaheim. Since the show moved to Las Vegas eight years ago, the Anaheim Convention Center has expanded, more hotels offering a greater range in room prices have been built and Disney has constructed a freestanding parking lot, where show participants can park their rigs.

But Roger Sherrard, president of ITSM, doesn't feel comfortable moving the show to Anaheim, claiming that hotels there are more expensive and labor more of a hassle.

ITSM and CTA also have differing goals about the show's reach. Sherrard – who began managing the show when his father Gary retired after 23 years – claims the CTA told him it was moving the show to better focus on the needs of California members. Anderson said the Intl. Trucking Show has positioned itself as a Western event, reaching out for attendees no farther than New Mexico and Idaho, places served by John Wayne Airport in Santa Ana, Calif.

But Sherrard believes Las Vegas has the advantage of being able to lure participants from the entire country and abroad. "When we moved to Las Vegas, we lost a large percentage of our California market, but we gained an audience from almost every other market in the country," he said.

In addition, Sherrard feels the September dates will force Intl. Trucking Show exhibitors to choose between it and major shows such as the Great American Trucking Show, held in September in Dallas, and MINExpo Intl., held in September in Las Vegas.

Like Anderson, Sherrard claims surveys support his decision to stay in Las Vegas in the spring. So, when the CTA offered him a contract to continue managing the show in Anaheim, he turned it down.

By a month before the last Intl. Trucking Show in June 2003, Sherrard had decided to stay in Las Vegas and launch his own event. To head off confusion about the competing shows, ITSM distributed a news release announcing The Truck Show Las Vegas. Sherrard said, "We like to say we're the old show with a new name, because all the staff that produced the show before will keep doing it at the same time and place."

He said he is holding dates at the convention center through 2015, with 400,000 square feet, the entire North Hall, contracted for this year.

The Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority declined comment on the matter. This may be because there is a lawsuit, filed by the CTA against ITSM, pending in Yolo County (California) Superior Court. The CTA wouldn't comment on the suit, which claims breach of contract.