As ISH celebrated its 50th anniversary this year, it occurred to me that my first day working for Showerlux was being taken out to ISH in 1979, when the show was in its 20th year. 

Over the last five decades, the bathroom industry has had many ups and downs, surviving a number of recessions and market booms. On top of this, there have been many style trends, from the avocado bathroom of the 70's now doing full circle, to the minimalist and contemporary look of 21st Century.

Unfortunately though, whilst exhibitions are generally meant to be upbeat, there's no denying the current state of the market and this grim mood was reflected heavily at this year's exhibition. This was despite every exhibition stand being booked with over 2,400 manufacturers attending. 

The question most commonly asked was 'How bad is it for you?', with the general consensus from all sectors of the industry ranging from 20%-40% down since the start of the year.

The good news however was despite visitor numbers being down on previous years, there still was a steady stream of people attending.  As I expected though, there were very few British there, mainly due to manufacturers not inviting people out, which was disappointing.

From a personal perspective, I was out there on behalf of Showerlux with Duscholux, our parent company, who were showcasing their latest products and concepts, including angular shaped baths and basins formed from Corian material and plenty of wet room designs.  We will be looking at introducing some of these products into the UK market later this year, more of which I will talk about over the coming months.

At the moment though, there's no getting away from the fact that on everyone's lips is the current market conditions.  The reality is that the credit crunch and recession is hitting the bathroom industry hard.  Whilst the outlook is bleak though, I believe those that can weather the storm will be in the strongest position when the market picks up again, hopefully in 2010!
 
Bob Bowler, md, Showerlux UK