Tampa Show Suppliers: ‘If You See It, Buy It. It Will Sell Out’

The Supplier Expo saw solid traffic Thursday. (Photos: Gary Gerard/RVBusiness)

TAMPA, Fla. – The sentiment of most suppliers in the two Supplier Expo buildings at the Florida RV SuperShow may have been best summed up Thursday (Jan. 19) by a bit of advice offered to consumers by Dometic officials.

“RVers like to shop things a little bit, but I guess if these people were asking me for advice, I would say I wouldn’t wait to buy something. If you see it, and you think it’s cool, you should buy it, because it’s selling out,” said Sara Dover, Dometic brand manager for activation.

She said the Dometic booth sold out of its Lusso Milano folding chairs Wednesday evening –  the first day of the show.

Sara Dover

“That was exciting,” she said. “This audience definitely loves luxury lounge chairs. That’s been awesome. We’ve had a lot of great conversations and purchases around our CFX powered coolers, which Dometic has been known for, so that’s been great, too.”

She said several consumers she interacted with had bought a rig and then approached Dometic to “trick it out a little bit more with a cooler, with camp furniture, that sort of thing.”

She said the Dometic Fresh Jet aftermarket air conditioner also drew a fair amount of attention with consumers asking things like, “How is it new?” and “Why is it better?”

Dometic is working with General RV in the parts barn for the first time this year, “and so that’s been kind of cool. It’s a great partnership. It’s nice that General’s working with us for inventory and having a presence in here really helps,” Dover said. “It’s kind of that full-spectrum partner for their customer. It’s been really good.”

So far, she hasn’t seen a good mix of consumers, mostly retirees, since Wednesday was senior day. “I would say your target audience here so far is 54-plus,” she said, but expected that to change as the show headed into the weekend.

“I really would like to see the younger folks come out this weekend,” she said, because several of the products on the display are aimed at a younger, overlander-type audience.

“This weekend, I’m hoping the foot traffic is just insane,” she said.

Jack Enfield

At the MORryde booth, where aftermarket RV step solutions were on display, Jack Enfield, sales and marketing manager, also was seeing brisk traffic.

“It’s been a real busy two days,” he said. “We went into it wondering if there were going to be any economic headwinds or anything like that, that was going to dampen the attendance or the enthusiasm, and almost two days in it feels just like last year. Really solid.”

Leading RV supplier Lippert Components Inc. had an expansive display in the second Supplier Expo building and Craig Joachim, Lippert director of customer experience, characterized the first two days as going “incredibly well.

The expansive Lippert Components Inc. booth drew large numbers of consumers.

“The booth has been absolutely nonstop,” he said. “We’ve been getting a lot of enthusiastic customers coming through asking all about, ‘What’s Lippert?’, ‘What is Lippert Scouts?’ (an RVing and camping forum created by Lippert to gain feedback and insights from campers). We’re thrilled about the turnout so far.”

Joachim said he has seen a full range of demographics. “It’s cool, too, because we’re getting a lot of people coming her to look at their next purchase, and we’re also finding people coming here looking for inspiration, too.

“A lot of what’s happening at this booth is just trying to educate people on where Lippert falls into the mix of things,” he said. “Obviously, as a supplier to the industry there’s a lot of education that needs to happen there. So, we help them. They might find an RV that’s almost perfect, but they need an upgrade to make it just absolutely awesome, so we can help them find that aftermarket upgrade.”

At the Blue Ox boot, Britton Wall, national account manager for the Pender, Neb.-based towing components manufacturer said, “It’s going very well. I think the traffic here is quite a bit better than last year. Weather, I think, has helped out with that.”

He said one difference so far this year is that he is seeing RVers who aren’t staying at the fairgrounds.

Blue Ox National Account Manager Britton Wall

“Last year it was basically all the people who were staying onsite,” he said. “We’ve been doing a lot of business here.”

So far, most of the business was coming from an older, retiree crowd, but he foresees a change for the weekend.

“I expect that really probably Friday afternoon, Saturday and Sunday, the crowd will change,” he said.

Mark Willis, a manufacturer’s rep with Tom Manning & Associates working for Stromberg Carlson Products Inc., said this:

“It’s been super busy. Did you see all the people walking around here?”

Source: https://rvbusiness.com/tampa-show-suppliers-if-you-see-it-buy-it-it-will-sell-out/