Nashville, TN – Last week The Deli and Delicious Audio debuted their Stompbox Exhibit at NAMM during the summer leg of the musical merchants convention hosted in Nashville TN.
The main goal of this exhibit was to allow smaller guitar pedal manufacturers to be present at the most important show in the US at a fraction of the cost, and eleven small manufacturers took this opportunity to showcase their pedals – including more established pedal maker Pigtronix (big supporters of our show and also present at NAMM with their own booth) and veterans of the scene BearFoot FX and Boomerang. (The full list of participating manufacturers can be found here).
Only 3 manufacturers were manning their boards (BearFoot, Boomerang and TSVG Pedals), and since it was TSVG’s first appearance at NAMM we thought it would be interesting to ask owner Mike Klein some questions about this experience.
Mike, could you give us some feedback about the Stompbox Exhibit at NAMM for your company?
2013 Summer NAMM was our first convention. We didn’t know what to expect, but it was incredible. We made great contacts and put faces to many of the people we already work with. NAMM is really a must for any company that wants to grow.
Could you list the specific events that made this experience worthwhile for you in order of importance?
We were interviewed by Premier Guitar Magazine (pictured) for our Slow Ride OD/Fuzz. The video will circulate via Facebook and their youtube channel. We also made deals with Amazon.com as well as quite a few guitar shop owners. Also, being able to meet the dealers you work with in person is priceless. Building on existing relationships with our dealers is very important to us.
How important do you think it is to have a person manning the board during the show?
After this show we would consider it a must. It is much easier to get people excited about your product when you are there to show and explain it to them. The boards at our booth that were not manned seemed to get less attention because there wasn’t a person focused on promoting them, although Paolo was directing visitors to them depending on what they were looking for.
Summer NAMM is probably 1/10th in size compared to Winter NAMM, do you think TSVG will be participating to the January convention in Anaheim?
Yes, we have to. Summer NAMM made us realize that if you really want to make it as a boutique builder, in a super over saturated market, you have to go out and bring the product to the people. With the success that we experienced at Summer NAMM, we would be foolish to not keep the momentum going through Winter NAMM.
More pictures of the NAMM exhibit can be found on our Facebook page here.
