Ski and Snowboard Show North.

By calling it the ‘Ski and Snowboard Show’ I was expecting something entertaining, something spectacular, something worth spending money on.

Or is that just me?

Instead, I feel the foray of the organisers to a grubby warehouse unit around the back of the Trafford Centre in Manchester was a miss. The Ski and Snowboard Show was little more than a few outdoor retailers selling ends of lines, a few interesting (but not very entertaining) seminars on avalanche avoidance and a few caterers offering traditional alpine fayre. The show was not a patch on the Christmas Markets in town.

I felt quite sorry for the teams from the Tirol, from St Anton to Pillersee Tal. They had obviously spent a whole wad of cash on sponsoring the ‘show’. The team shipped their huge exhibition stand to Manchester and hired loads of staff only for them to end up talking to each other for the better part of three days.

• Where were the exhibition skiers and snowboarders?
• Did no one book our Winter Olympic hopefuls to show off their skiing and snowboarding skills and sign autographs?
• Where were ‘fashion shows’ of all the latest ski clothing and outdoor gear?
• What about giant screens showing ski freestylers doing what they do best?

If the organisers expect us Northerners to spend our hard earned cash on tickets to their ‘show’ next year, they must try harder, much, much harder; we won’t pay to get into a ski trade exhibition twice!