NRA Moves 2007 Show to St. Louis
By Rachelle Crum -- Tradeshow Week, 8/15/2005
St. Louis— home to the Arch, toasted ravioli and now the 2007 Natl. Rifle Assn. show.
The NRA on Aug. 4 announced that it would hold its 136th Annual Meeting and Exhibits at the city's America's Center/Cervantes Convention Center April 13–17. The association in July decided to move the 2007 show out of Columbus, Ohio, as a result of the Columbus City Council's decision to ban citizens from owning semiautomatic firearms.
"The Second Amendment stands at the gateway of freedom and there is no better place to celebrate freedom than St. Louis," NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre said.
St. Louis is "the gateway to the heartland of America and thousands of NRA members and supporters," he added. To be precise, 400,000 members within a 300-mile radius.
The show, which is expected to draw at least 60,000 attendees and generate $20 million for the city, "has the potential to be the largest convention in NRA history," LaPierre noted.
The city, along with St. Louis County, in July began issuing concealed weapons permits after Gov. Matt Blunt signed legislation aimed at fixing what the jurisdictions dubbed a funding mechanism flaw in the state's 2003 concealed guns bill. Also, according to the Brady Campaign, there are no limitations on assault weapons in Missouri.
Nevertheless, Bruce Sommer, director of the convention center — which offers 502,000 square feet of exhibit space — said show attendees will not be permitted to bring guns inside the center. "We don't allow weapons," he said, adding, "There would be no reason for them to bring their weapons in."
St. Louis Convention & Visitors Commission President Carole Moody said that the center's restrictions wouldn't affect the show. "I don't think that would be a problem."
The show is a coup for the CVC, Moody said, because it has been attempting to book the NRA show since 1999. "It's been a 6-year process for us. They were considering us for the year 2009, and when this development occurred in Columbus, they called us right away," she said. "It's a very exciting piece of business in a relatively short period of time."
The 2006 NRA show is scheduled to take place May 19–23, 2006, at the Midwest Airlines Center in Milwaukee, a city that prohibits concealed weapons. However, an NRA spokeswoman told Tradeshow Week, the group is supporting a bill that proposes to overturn the prohibition, to be introduced in the Wisconsin Senate (again, as it was vetoed by Gov. Jim Doyle in 2004) as early as September.
The 2005 NRA show was held in April in Houston, attracting 60,000 attendees and 450 exhibiting companies to a 110,000 sq. ft. showfloor.
