Apr. 7—HIGH POINT — High Point Market organizers said they were pleased with attendance at the spring trade show, which officially ended its five-day run Wednesday.
Preliminary figures showed the number of buying companies at Market was up 3.26% and the number of individual buyers was up 4.43% compared to the October 2021 Market, market authority President and CEO Tom Conley told the organization's board of directors Wednesday.
"Those numbers really reflect, I think, an upward mobility," he said.
This Market saw the return of several major retailers sending significant numbers of individual buyers for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic began.
These included companies such as Wayfair, Rooms to Go, Lowe's, Overstock, Target, Macy's, Amazon and Williams-Sonoma.
"We're seeing the retailers come back, and I think that, in combination with the growth of designer traffic, is really adding to it," Conley said.
Buyer attendance was down roughly 17-19% from the fall 2019 Market, which was the last trade show before the pandemic.
Market attendance dropped about 60% in October 2020, the first trade show after the pandemic took hold, but has been rebounding since.
Also Wednesday, board member Doug Bassett said the $2.95 million market authority gets each year from the state was made recurring in the budget the General Assembly adopted in November 2021.
"That means that, unless something is proactively done to change that number, that's the amount of money we'll get going forward," Bassett said. "Traditionally, not 100 percent of that money was recurring, but it is now."
The market authority uses the money on transportation services for marketgoers and for promotion and marketing.