Jan 26, 2021

This past week was the first-ever Virtual Toronto International Boat Show and you can read the report of the results in the story below. It was a major undertaking for the staff and suppliers at Canadian Boat Shows to create a seven-day program of seminars, videos and on-screen boat displays, but they did it. Next up is the Virtual Vancouver International Boat Show from February 24 to 27, but then in Atlantic Canada, The Halifax International Boat Show opens for a conventional live, in-person show from March 25 to 28, 2021. It will be educational to see how the live Halifax show compares to the virtual shows.

Please note the Vancouver dates are February 24 to 27. Somehow on the internet, this was shown as Feb 3 to 7 – that is incorrect. We had Googled the show dates to check for a story last week and that was how we accidentally ran the wrong dates in the January 19 News Week Digest. So, to be clear, the Virtual Vancouver International Boat Show runs from February 24 to 27, 2021.

Anyway…the interesting aspect to a virtual show is that you can track the metrics as you go.

Canadian Yachting and also PORTS Cruising Guides had separate booth spaces at TIBS and we were watching our numbers throughout the show. We gained new subscribers to Canadian Yachting magazine and we sold a fair number of PORTS Cruising Guides, so that aspect of the show was working for us.  We will be anxious to hear other people’s reports from TIBS and from those two upcoming shows.

We are hearing about a strong demand for new boats, but there is also a lot of talk about limited inventories. Dealers are putting the pressure on their customers to move now if they want a new boat (or to grab a used one for that matter).

I believe there is great value in research and statistics and the virtual shows give us some hard numbers that we have never previously had, so that’s good. But, with this edition of Boating Industry Canada News Week Digest, we are starting a series of short and simple reader surveys to gather information that we can share back to you.

Canada does not have the depth of research data that our peers in the US get from the NMMA and several other national and international industry associations and that research can be very important to your planning and management, especially in a unique and strange year like we are having in 2020 / 2021.

So, I hope you will take a few minutes to respond to our first survey in this edition of Boating Industry Canada News Week Digest. We plan to run a series of information sharing surveys with you this spring. Let’s share the news and gain the greatest advantage available from this coming season.

Andy Adams – Editor