PRI sold to SEMA!

[Dynoroom]

Breaking news in the trade, the Performance Racing Indusrty's (PRI) trade show & magazine have been sold to SEMA. Steve Lewis is going racing so he took the money a ran with it so it seems.
Sure to be a bit of a shake up in the performance biz advertising now....

[SpiderGearsMan]

will sema get better ot pri get worse

[Brian Lohnes]

I can't see this being a bad thing. This was my first PRI experience, and it was good, but the guys who have been around for a while said that the show was very small compared to what it had been. I ran into a bunch of SEMA guys down there and we chatted. I asked what they were doing and they kind of smiled and just said they were observing.

Guess I know why now!

[Dynoroom]

Well Brian, just remember that PRI came into being because SEMA was selling crome wheels, trailer balls, & colored dash lights. The "hard core" racing parts didn't fit into the program any longer. PRI brought that back together. SEMA is still focused on retail "goodies" with a few performance items. You'll notice that not to many pro racer parts show up at SEMA, thus my concern that PRI might take a hit, this we don't need IMO. Glad I'm going to PRI this your, who knows what it'll become in the future...

[SpiderGearsMan]

my favorite at sema in the ninties was watching the rise of the prc
some lively political debate from my buddies and I with red chinese sales reps

[Matt Cramer]

Well Brian, just remember that PRI came into being because SEMA was selling crome wheels, trailer balls, & colored dash lights. The "hard core" racing parts didn't fit into the program any longer. PRI brought that back together. SEMA is still focused on retail "goodies" with a few performance items. You'll notice that not to many pro racer parts show up at SEMA, thus my concern that PRI might take a hit, this we don't need IMO. Glad I'm going to PRI this your, who knows what it'll become in the future...

I hope it doesn't become SEMA East either. But from the press release, it appears that SEMA gets that PRI is a different clientelle. Let's hope they are able to keep PRI focussed on being performance and racing.

[SuperBuickGuy]

The only reason I can think for any merger is the economies of scale argument.

I'm surprised there isn't some nod to the regulatory boards - after all, controlling the two largest shows for new, specialty, automotive products would seem to be something the Anti-trust folks at the DOJ would be interested in looking at.

[dieselgeek]

I can't see this being a bad thing. This was my first PRI experience, and it was good, but the guys who have been around for a while said that the show was very small compared to what it had been. I ran into a bunch of SEMA guys down there and we chatted. I asked what they were doing and they kind of smiled and just said they were observing.

Guess I know why now!

PRI was bigger before the dirt track guys got all pissy and started their own show, at the exact same time as PRI. Held in various cities.

I think SEMA is annoying, you can't see all the booths in a single week and most of it is bling crap like see-through wheels and fake diamonds glued onto an Audi. It's also a nightmare if you're a vendor presenting at SEMA, which was my case, so maybe I am biased.

PRI was like SEMA concentrate to me. I hope it would stay that way but I doubt it.

[Jimbo17]

I received the notice yesterday from Steve Lewis and I was wondering what type of racing he is doing?

They had wanted me to join and been asking me for a while now but I just never got around to it.

Jimbo