Although snow and ice created difficulties for some Dealers to access Cincinnati, this 1st day of attendance at the V-Twin Expo was pretty good. I will report in the next days about what I have seen, and for now will just make the remark that I was surprised by the number of new wheels (designs & sizes) introduced this year. And of course, I met most of my professional friends of the industry. Below a few pictures about the V-Twin Expo atmosphere. From left to right, top to bottom. 1- Icy Cincinnati 2- Performance Machine Rig. 3- 10 am. Doors open. Let’s get busy 4- Arlen Ness 5- Ron Finch, Rogue. 6- Ness Tattoo Wheel 7- 30″ Bagger Front Wheell 8-Jil & John Parham (J&P Cycles), Kody Wisner 9- Mike Tomas & wife (Kiwi Indian) 10- Arnie (Tricky Air & Billet) with Sukoshi Fahey (Avon) 11-Internal Brake Wheel 12- Vee Rubber 30″ Prototype Tire 13- Cool Racing Rear Fender.
26 Responses to “V-Twin Expo Atmosphere”
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i wish i was there V-Twin expo is all ways fun !
Thank you for the great coverage Cyril!
Great show up beat very exiting.. Looks like we are taking a turn straight up for the coming year.
The V-Twin Expo is one of the events that I look forward to attending every year.
There are many new products and I am happy to say that I will be doing some installs and Tech Reports in the near future.
It is not all work and the socializing and partying after the show closes for the day goes on.
As you can see I did get to see Cyril and have our photo taken.
Back to the expo for todays events, See Ya Rogue
Does Tedd Cycle® have anything NEW in old repop?
Cyril,
Great pictures of the show. Thanks for for all of the great info and the photo coverage. Without it, those of us unable to attend would be left out. Thanks for all you do…..and the awesome way that you do it. My students love all the new wheel designs and those incredibly large tires. Who knows, maybe they will do something with a unique set of wheels next year. Thanks again.
-Darin
Cyril,
Great photos of the show and the coverage you have posted. My first time at the show and it was a super experience. Thank you for taking the time to talk to a newcomer. Your daily blog keeps me up to date on the trends and innovations. Your insight into 2010 was invaluable to me as we plan our motorcycle rides, new content on our blog and work toward being more involved in a great industry. Again, thank you for your time, I know you were busy at the expo.
Len
The Cinci V Twin Expo is our own trade show and I believe it is what we make of it. Everyone seems upbeat and there are many great opportunities upon us. In a down economy the heard has been thinned however those that persevere and continue to sow seeds are seeing results. Passion about ones business helps get those through the tough times. And as a side note it as nice to see Teach in clean non oily pants. Obviously his airplane was Indian powered and not Knucklehead powered.
Cyril, Nice Pictures but, What happened to Michelle Smith? She would have been the first Person that I would have looked up ! I would like to see some pictures of MICHELLE SMITH ! That Chic is Gorgeous.
Great seeing you Cyril. I also beleive that Michelle is going to be back with Jay working but I’m not possitive on that.
The 2008 Road Glide with the 30″ front wheel & tire that Tim at Ballistic Cycles
built is cool looking!
Michele was at the show … at least I saw her at the Hyatt on Friday evening.
Over & Out,
Jeff
Great time as always and thanks to everyone in the industry for the overwhelming support for the high school chopper classes. It was an honor to be on Michael Lichters panel to speak and I hope we can keep spreading the word on building the future of our industry. And Mike nice stickers on the back of your Indian hauling rig! Change your luck ride a knuck!
I don’t even have to ask how she Look’s, do I ?
NOPE! She looks better now without that friggin cowboy hat on!
Over & Out,
Jeff
Michelle was difinitely there. She took a rest on the Black X-Wedge powered FXR I built for the S&S Cycle display before interviewing George Smith, and if you’ve only seen her on the tube trust me – in person is an even bigger treat. Stunning!
• Change your luck ride a knuck.
• Be a man ride a Pan.
************************************************
We were waiting for that knuckle slogan.
Stop the grief, get a Chief.
(Although knucks are pretty cool too)
The bottom line is that the show is in BIG trouble.
-Exhibitor attendance WAY down
-Attendee attendance WAY down
I have been an exhibitor there for a while, and all the exhibitors I spoke to said the same thing. Saturday is always the best day, and this year Saturday wasn’t that great. Sunday was only good for an hour or two (and most of the attendees were the same guys you saw on Saturday), and Monday as usual had only a tiny tiny number of attendees.
The media coverage of this event is horrible. There were quite a new new exhibitors there. There were a LOT of new products. And there is (so far) been zero coverage of that here or anywhere else.
Many of the attendees are local hole-in-the-wall shop owners (nothing wrong with that, but the show just doesn’t draw the big names from other places). Most of the attendees are from within maybe 200-300 miles of Cinci.
I spoke to some BIG NAME exhibitors who are not sure if they will be back next year, and most people seemed to think the show won’t be around in a few more years.
The other problem is that Daytona is in 2 weeks, and a lot of guys choose to go to Daytona instead of Cinci. Maybe they should move when the V-Twin expo is? Or move where it is? Or both?
Doggy,
I have displayed there twice a few years back…now I walk the floor and must agree with most of your statements above.
The V-Twin Expo’s show location and timing is not appropriate with Dealer News Indy Dealer Expo and Bikeweek. The V-Twin Expo should be held in a place such as the Daytona or Orlando area maybe a week before Bikeweek…this would facilitate travel and eliminate some major expenses and separate the V-Twin expo from the Indy show which markets virtually everything and is not focused on the VTwin marketplace.
Enough is enough please…palm trees and blue water….not snow & ice. As I talked with a good friend at Cinci…let’s make this business fun again and not let others control like the corporate world.
I know that there will be pro & con comments here regarding my post and I welcome them from those that attend the trade shows….others that do not attend oh well.
Boss Hawg
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I’ve been an exhibitor at V twin since the begining of the show, and agree 100% with Boss Hawg on this one. Orlando has a fantastic convention center, ample hotel rooms close by that are reasonably priced, and plenty of value priced food in walking distance. Move the show to the week after Indy, then everyone makes the 1 hour drive to Daytona for the next event. Let’s put ourselves in our customers (the dealer) shoes for a minute…. Would you rather get scalped on everything in Cinci and fight the weather, or get a good deal in Orlando, some nice weather, and throw in bike week for those who want to stay the next week. We need to give people a reason to go, if we don’t the V twin Expo will continue to die a slow death…. another thing I find curious, why did Jim allow non motorcycle vendors in? Home entertainment, jewelery, and somone selling nuts and candy? what’s next, the Sham-wow guy? It’s the begining of the end when this happens to any industry show.
I agree that the week after Indy (and the week before Daytona) would be better. The guys that run Indy claim that it’s a good location because so many people are within a half day drive of Cinci. That’s all very well and good, but where is the center of the custom bike industry? Probably FL and CA. And it sure ain’t Ohio (no offense). Cinci is an expensive city for hotels. It is good for the exhibitors because there is no union at the Duke center, so it is easy to move in and move out… but they charge over 2 grand per 10×10 booth, plus you are going to drop at least $3k more for hotel, electric, food, flight (or gas), and then you have time away from the shop.
They let in all sorts of vendors most likely because they are seriously HURTING for exhibitors, and they need to do something to fill as much space as they can.
I don’t want to name names but I will just say that quite a few of the new exhibitors won’t be there next year, and some of the guys who have been there since the show started won’t be there either. Can the V-Twin expo survive next year with 30% less exhibitors?
If all of the big customers aren’t in Cinci, then the exhibitors won’t be either. And if all of those guys are in Daytona, then that is where the industry trade show needs to be also. Do it the weekend before Daytona starts, so that way vendors can do the dealer show and Daytona show too.
Finally, there is way too much incestuousness in this industry. What I mean is that I worked the V-Twin expo all weekend and I walked around and talked to a lot of the new exhibitors. There were a LOT of new companies and products there. And none of them got any press. Not on this blog. Not in the magazines (the magazines weren’t even at the show!).
Look at the industry awards… the same big companies always get the awards as usual (and those entries were submitted last SUMMER), and they don’t even want your product, they just want to read about it.
How are the industry awards legitimate when they go to the same big names every year? How is the press coverage legitimate when NONE of the magazines are there doing stories and even the bloggers are just promoting the same big companies and taking celeb-shots with industry names?
The show just doesn’t offer and value for the exhibitor which means it doesn’t offer any value for the attendee, which means it will be gone soon.
I appreciate the great responses we have gotten for our 30 inch bagger and our new bag and panel kit . I also want to state that it would not have been possible without my brother mike and his amazing abilities sculpting these crazy designs and turning them into physical realities.
Sorry I missed this year, but it wasn’t in the cards for us. We’re trying like hell to hang on. I hate to hear that the show was a bust, but I kinda figured it was.
Not sure why some of you think the show was a bust but for me and my company we did Good. There was definately less people but the ones that did show up are the strong companies that are buying and will be buying in the near future so I don’t think that the show was a flop by a long shot. Maybe it is the products that you guys are offering. It could be price, quality or just design. But its not the show that is causing your shops to fail. Instead of coming to this website and whining you all might want to try doing something that will help you have a better show next year like designing new and better products at a more reasonable price. The Cinci show is much better than the Indy show for V-Twin people. If you think that very few people showed up for the V-Twin show go to Indy and see how many V-Twin people are there. Any way good luck and I do hope you all have a better year this year than last.
We had a good show but warm weather and palm trees sound pretty friggin good to me. I’m from the south and the only thing we like about ice is when its in our Jack.