The most recent SEMA Show 2021 was really lacking in many ways. I will tell you that I am no expert but that this is my 3rd SEMA Show to attend and I am sad to say that I was underwhelmed. Not that I didn’t meet wonderful celebrities or new friends, though the list of celebrities was severely lacking from previous years, I did. In fact, I am proud to say that I am now somewhere between acquaintance and friend to some of those in the Kindig circle. Pretty cool. But why was it lacking? It was due to extra long travel distances, builders and vendors pulling out, and the chatter that SEMA members are pushing to make SEMA Show a public show instead of a trade show. Okay, and the lack of automotive celebrities. Let’s attack that first, shall we?

Celebrities! So exciting! Getting to meet the people in the industry who you look up to and admire. Chip Foose, Dave Kindig, Ron Covell, Jay Leno, Gene Winfield, Faye Hadley, and Bogi. You may not be familiar with all of those names, but I am.  I met all of them at SEMA. Faye was MIA this year like many other celebrities as the number of celebrity appearences was drastically lower than the previous show. I literally couldn’t get around to all of the meet and greets in previous years. The most likely culprit to the absences was COVID and the indoor mask mandate that went along with it in Vegas. Not that the mandate mattered too much. After day one, at least 75% if attendees were maskless.  

 The brand spankin’ new  West Exhibition Hall was unveiled this year for the SEMA Show and housed three catagoreies of the show: Restyling & Car Care Accessories, Powersports & Utility Vehicles, and Trucks, SUVs & Off Road. The West Hall was spacious, so spacious, it seemed fairly empty.  This was especially disappointing after walking so far to see everything.  SEMA Show is not for the faint of heart if walking makes you faint, anyway because you will be doing a TON of walking to see everything. This is not the place to “break in” new shoes. Trust me on this.  Hoverboards, Segways, skateboards, skates or scooters (either motorized or foot powered) are not allowed at SEMA Show for obvious reasons. But I’m not gonna lie, paying to use them was an option I would have shelled out for by Wednesday!  One thing that was new this year is the very cool Tesla Tunnels. Thanks Elon! Named “The Las Vegas Convention Center Loop”, these tunnels are only 1.5 miles long and facilitate Teslas to come pick you up or drop you off at three different locations. West Hall, Central Hall, and North Hall. The tunnels are really, really cool. They are also a nice break and the BEST way to get from the North Hall to the West Hall. (Note: The Vegas Loop is expanding to 29 miles and 51 stops. Some of those stops include hotels on the west side of the freeway which include Rio, Orleans, and Palms.) The Loop at the convention center was free. Hopefully that will continue to be the case when you stay within this loop.

What do you mean builders and companies pulled out of the show?? Well, they canceled last minute is what I mean. News spread like wildfire that the 2021 SEMA Show would pulling a first in SEMA Show history and would be open the public on Friday. What’s the big deal? Well, the SEMA Show is a closed event. You have to be IN the automotive industry to attend. See semashow.com for details.  Now, I can say that I don’t know why some vendors decided to back out, specifically Milwaukee and GearWrench, but I can share that the rumors I heard about why builders pulled their cars from the show were specifically about the public being allowed in. Let me explain further why this is an issue. Have you ever been to a public car show and some cars have signs while others are physically roped off to say “Do not touch”? But then there’s “Ken the car aficionado” who just has to run his hand across the perfectly polished clear coat, whistles, and then tells no one in particular how much work it is to get that high shine but actually have absolutely no idea, not to mention that he just scratched the car with his belt  buckle as he leaned in to “just have a look around”. That guy. That guy is the reason why some builders don’t want their cars around the public. They just spent way too much time and hard work on their build to have some jackass come up and touch it, or worse, try to get in it (don’t act like you have never seen anyone do this at car shows. you know you have.). At the 2021 SEMA Show, I know several vehicles were damaged by the industry people at the show before they let the public in. I did speak  with a friend of mine with a very prominent vendor he said that aside from having to rope off the cars in their booth space, they would have to have an entirely different set of staff available for public verses who they use for the trade show. That makes sense to me. If you are a vendor at a public show, you’re going to want to have staff that are basically sales people compared to the designers and engineers that you would have at SEMA Show. 

The rumor is that SEMA is going to try to make the whole show open to the public which will kill vital networking opportunities for those in the field. What are my thoughts? Keep Ken out of SEMA.  Industry professionals don’t want his grimy person near their builds or at their booths.