Grassroots Outdoor Alliance (GOA) reported that specialty retail has had a strong year-to-date for 2023 as more than half of Grassroots retailers met or exceeded 2022 growth. At the same time, approximately 50 percent of retailers and 40 percent of brands reported feeling “over-inventoried” and have planned for stability following two years of record growth brought on by the pandemic.
At the recent Grassroots Connect trade show in Knoxville, TN, the GOA reported that the tone of business meetings on the show floor ranged from “guarded optimism” (Ed McAlister, River Sports Outfitters) and “cautiously optimistic” (Tracy Mayer, Backcountry North) to “quite positive” (Marc Sherman, Outdoor Gear Exchange) and even “surprisingly strong” (Chuck Millsaps, Great Outdoor Provision Company).
“I like to say at these meetings that we sit down and take out a box of risk and place it in the middle of the table, then we spend the next 45 min pushing it back and forth, trying to get the other to take a bit more,” said Todd Frank, owner of The Trail Head in Missoula, MT.
While the positives were anchored in a long-term belief in the strength of the overall outdoor recreation economy, the negatives were tied to more specific concerns, including oversupply and regional weather challenges.
“Our meetings were quite positive despite a universal understanding that the marketplace is overstocked across the entire supply chain for both vendors and dealers and that hardgoods sales were off by more than 30 percent,” shared Sherman. “In my experience, Connect is a gathering of like-minded friends and colleagues who typically exist in a world of bonhomie and good-spirited outlooks. That being said, we’re all trying to figure out how to get back from the East Coast winter that wasn’t and a saturated marketplace that is the hangover from the pandemic.”
GOPC’s Millspas added that he is concerned that the inventory imbalance or glut would cast a shadow over the optimistic view of the retailers. “We seem to be punching above our weight for the first months of 2023 as many other retail categories are struggling to hit pandemic high spikes of 2022,” he suggested. “I hope that the vendors are able to restrain their production to keep 2024 out of the ditches and that retailers like ours can continue to add luster to brands that innovate and inspire.”
The show started and ended with energy and sadness as Grassroots announced they are leaving Knoxville for future Connect shows in Reno, NV next spring, (read SGB’s coverage here.) There is a bit of history with the move to Reno, too, with many that attended the early Outdoor Retailer shows in the late 80s and early 90s remembering with fondness (or fogginess?) the Biggest Little City in the World.
