After several years in which many of the post-ICRS ruminations have been post mortems, it’s rather nice that this year’s reflections amount to more of a clean bill of health.

Even some of the positive comments that followed previous events came through rather clenched teeth, but this year they seem to be accompanied by genuine smiles. Quite a relief all round.

My sense is that last year in St. Louis, the show right-sided itself, like a boat coming through white waters, and now we can stop feeling queasy and concentrate on charting the currents ahead. In some ways, it’s a new show for a new era.

Before we get too euphoric, let’s acknowledge that we’re not talking high fives and cartwheels. Ten percent attendance growth over last year is good, but we need to remember that the 2011 event was in Atlanta, which has traditionally been one of the show’s strongest host cities.

Additionally, exhibitor numbers and booth spaces remained flat—in one respect, at least. Though suppliers may not have increased their show-floor footprint much, some of them did seem to be making more of their space, with displays rising high into what for the past few years has been largely dead air. It was almost as though they were holding their heads up again.

Once again, CBA managed and orchestrated the show floor well to create a sense of energy and busyness. How creative the team was became apparent the minute you stepped outside the exhibition hall into the rest of the huge convention center, where it felt like someone had staged a small group meeting in an aircraft hangar.

More kudos to CBA for ratcheting up the educational component once again. I heard great reviews from retailers for both the variety of topics and the strength of the presentations. And the daylong retail academy was by all accounts a great success.

Worth the price of admission on its own was George Barna’s opening-session presentation on how shifts in culture and technology are shaking up the publishing and retailing world. He didn’t pull any punches, but he did provide lots of food for thought and then led a spirited panel discussion with several industry leaders. Look for a recording of the proceedings at CBA’s Web site.

The organizers also did a great job in attracting Christian and general market media to the event, bringing lots of exposure to Christian products, authors and artists. Other pluses I saw and heard about included the express registration check-in that did away with the long lines of former years and the wider range of reasonably priced food options close to the exhibit floor.

Another reason for this year’s positive outcome, I believe, is that some suppliers and retailers alike have finally adjusted their expectations. 

Many suppliers have said for some time that the show has changed, it’s not about sales, blah blah, but they seem to have still looked to their bottom line as the primary indicator of a “good” event. This time around, I sensed there was more of a genuine recognition that ICRS is not primarily about orders—though, having said that, I also heard from a number who were quite happy with the business they did and who had worked hard with advance scheduling and on-the-floor energy to draw visitors. Gone are the days when you could just sit there in your booth and wait for orders, thank you very much.

I can understand how it used to be a bit tough for exhibitors to say cheerfully that the industry needs a place to meet, when they knew how much it was costing them to provide the opportunity for others to enjoy it at no charge, but now that they have their costs down and in line, it’s easier to say that genuinely.

Then there are the retailers. Gone seems to be the doom and gloom and the sense that the suppliers owed them something. Maybe the folks that brought that cloud are no longer around. The retailers I met at ICRS weren’t pretending things were easy. But they were for the most part optimistic, determined and appreciative of suppliers’ efforts to cooperate and collaborate.

Side note: I was also encouraged to hear how different stores are responding to the challenges they face with creativity and faith. One retailer told me how, recognizing customer care was the one thing Amazon and e-books couldn’t beat him on, he had increased his staffing—despite the down economy—to be able to give more time to shoppers, to help them and offer to pray with them. Get a bunch of those kinds of people in the same place and you’re bound to have a an inspiring time.

Though few, there were some misfires in Atlanta. The Champions of the Faith fund-raising evening started late and dragged on too long. The prayer meeting was poorly attended, though it’s not clear to me whether that’s because of the time it was scheduled—as the show floor was winding down—or the way it was presented, as an “if you can make it” kind of thing, rather than, “you can’t miss this.”

But overall, that’s like passing your annual checkup and then being told by the doctor that you should start watching your diet a bit more closely. There’s always going to be some room for improvement. Trimmed of the fat, ICRS is looking pretty good. I look forward to seeing what sort of shape the show is in when it comes to my Orlando hometown next year.