Salute 2006: Show report by Brandir

Wintermute 24/04/2006 - 17:39
Salute 2006 Saturday 22nd April 2006

Organised by the South London Warlords, Salute is the largest show dedicated to miniature wargaming in the UK and probably Europe (except GW and their Games Day!) Some 5500 people attended the event at the London Excel.

Before attending Salute, I had never been to the Excel. Having attended many trade shows at the NEC in Birmingham I was expecting something like that: nice carpeted floors with professional looking booths for all the traders and big open spaces for the demo games. But no, the hall they used had a rough dirty looking floor and reminded me of a massive sports hall that most wargaming shows are held in. I suppose that the organisers could have paid for swanky carpets and booths for the traders, but the cost was probably too much for a club-organised show.

Anyway, I must say that I had a traders badge for the show in my capacity as a Privateer Press Ganger involved in running demo games of WARMACHINE and HORDES. It was fortuitously coincidental that the date the organisers selected was the worldwide release date of HORDES, the new game from Privateer Press. As this is the biggest place for Privateer to strut their stuff in the UK they had a big stand, just opposite the main entrance.

At 10:00 hrs the doors opened and predictably enough they descended upon the Privateer Press stand. Although they do not sell direct to the public, their preferred model being to sell via local gaming shops, they make an exception at big events. So they had a few HORDES rulebooks and box sets for sale. The hordes descended on the shop element, gamers keen to buy their bits before it ran out! Both the shop staff and Press Gangers were kept exceptionally busy selling and demoing respectively. Of course, the HORDES demo games and products were far more popular than WARMACHINE. I noted that the best selling lines were the Skorne and Trollblood box sets. Privateer also brought along a huge mega game featuring Cryx and Protectorate troops on a superb Menoth temple board, and they sponsored a South London Warlords run HORDES Unleashed tournament. Both of these extras proved quite popular.

The size of the event also attracted some Privateer Press 'celebrities' from the US. Matt Wilson (Creative Director and creator of the Iron Kingdoms), Sherry Yeary (President of PP), Mike McVey (Miniatures Director) and Alison McVey (painter). They were a hit with the punters and signed copies of HORDES for the various fanboys around. I have to admit getting my copy signed by these, along with miniature designers Kev White and Adam Clarke who were also at Salute with their own enterprises.

The only negative from a PP point of view was the lack of pre-release models. I know it was HORDES release day, but it would have been a bit more special if PP had some pre-releases for WARMACHINE to buy such as the new Trencher, Captain Maxwell Finn. Big shows need pre-release models.

The show was not all about Privateer Press. There were over 140 traders and demo games in the hall to occupy the gamers. The vast majority of traders were the usual wargaming show crowd. Additionally there were a few distributors and publishers and some LARPers and historical re-enactment societies.

Highlights for me were the stands of Kev White of www.hasslefreeminiatures.co.uk and dam Clarke of www.blackscorpionminiatures.com both of whom also sculpt for Privateer Press. For example Kev White has done the new Circle minis and some of the Trollbloods.I also liked the BITS (British Isles Traveller Support) stand, but that is for nostalgic reasons as they had lots of those LBBs that brought back some good memeories!

The venue was good. Big and lots of room, the hall did not suffer from usual wargaming show problems (too hot, too cold, too smelly). There were also plenty of onsite food outlets, cash machines and toilets. The venue was also very accessible for those with mobility problems. There were too many demo games where people were merely invited to watch club members play a big board game.

Overall there were about 5500 people in the hall, down from about 6000 the previous year. But many traders seemed to report poor takings. From the number of wargaming shows I have attended over the past twelve months it is apparent that many traders are reporting a bad year at shows. Why is that? Is there a general malaise in the industry? Are there too many new traders? Has the internet caused a loss of sales? Are people fed up of the show format?

Well, I would say that all the above statements are true to a certain extent. But the main one for reduced attendance is, I think, a lack of emphasis on playing games. The show that I attended in Feb, www.hammerhead.org.uk was aimed at people playing games and seemed to work.

It would also help if wargaming shows were not held in dingy sports halls. Organisers should follow the South London Warlords and try and find more professional exhibition halls.

Salute was OK. But it would have been far better if the organisers had allocated space for people to 'bring and battle' and also hosted mini tournaments for a number of gaming systems. They missed an opportunity to re-emphasis the gaming aspects of our hobby and treated the event as yet another place to buy and sell minis. People can do that on the net; shows need to realise this if they want to survive.

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