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The February 27 - March 3, 2010 ASD Show by the numbers, according to show management - over 2,400 exhibitors, hundreds of thousands of products across 100 categories including Gift, Jewelry, Style & Beauty and Value & Variety at the Sands Expo Center and Las Vegas Convention Center.

The show continued its “evolution of ASD” with specialized sections attracting buyers representing independent retailers, department stores, national chains and internet retailers among the over 45,000 attendees - an increase of 15 percent over last year.

This was somewhat of a transitional show venue-wise; in anticipation of the consolidation of the show in its entirety into the Las Vegas Convention Center in August, 2011, many Sands Expo Center exhibitors made the move to the LVCC at the Feb-March show. Going forward, the LVCC’s North, Central and South Halls will house the entire ASD Show in the summer, while the Sands Expo Center and the LVCC will continue to co-locate the show in the winter editions.

The section of the show that is now informally known as the Military Tactical Outdoor Show (official signage, distinctive decoration and recognition of the MTO Show seems to be withering away) can always be viewed as an anomaly to the official show numbers, and the section fares poorly or well based on its own mitigating circumstances.

Surpies and other closely related exhibitors and buyers still are grouped on the show floor, but the section continues to abate in strength of numbers. Some of this is attributable to a still-underperforming economy, some at this show perhaps due to the influece of the SHOT Show and the Army Navy Military Expo which took place just six weeks prior to ASD.

Reaction to the show varied from unsatisfactory to pleasant surprise at its success.

“The ASD Show in winter has always been financially viable, with new orders, new business, new accounts,” said Danny Fox of Fox Outdoor.

Not so much this time, though.

“This was the was the first show in 30 years that was not viable. But we knew going in that some of our accounts had already seen us at The SHOT Show and at the Army Navy Military Expo,” Fox noted.

Fox still intends to support ASD in acknowledgement of his company’s roots at the show. But he may scale back on his exhibit space going forward.

Jeff Daniel of Sturm enjoyed a decent ASD Show, and was especially pleased that the three-show season (SHOT, ANM Expo and ASD) ended on an upbeat note.

“The ASD Show was better than expected, especially after a very good ANM Expo,” Daniel explained.

Ken Hirsch of Schreck Wholesale felt that they recovered from a substandard first day (traditionally, the first day at ASD is verdant with business).