The Pool & Spa Show: Powered by NESPA celebrated its first show out of COVID’s shadow.

“This year was such a return to form, in not just what you saw with your eyes but just how it felt,” said Dominick Mondi, executive director of the Northeast Spa and Pool Association, which organizes the event. “The industry was excited, they were happy to be there, they were happy to be with each other.”

In 2021, the group offered its show virtually, while the emergence of a new COVID variant had its impact last year.

While officials continue to reconcile the exact data from the event, they estimate attendance in the same neighborhood as the 2020 show, which broke records.

“I think this year we delivered the right audience for the companies that were exhibiting,” Mondi said.

Approximately 365 exhibitors occupied more than 105,000 square feet of booth space.

This year, the organization broke what some in the tradeshow business consider a cardinal rule — holding educational sessions during some show hours. While conventional wisdom says doing so will reduce the amount of time attendees spend on the floor with exhibitors, Mondi said the courses actually kept attendees in the convention center longer, and created more consistent traffic rather than drastic peaks in the morning and valleys in the late afternoon.

On the show floor, highlights once again included The Wall. Set along the back of the show, it featured hands-on seminars and demonstrations addressing vinyl-liner measurement, variable-speed pumps and tile, and heater troubleshooting. A miniature vinyl-liner pool was built so attendees could practice measuring, walls were erected so attendees could apply tile, and a few manufacturers displayed and showed their variable-speed pumps so students could learn the various technologies and techniques for each.

“If we had more seats, we would have [booked] more,” Mondi said.

In all, the event included 127 educational sessions.

The mood on the floor was positive, not only because the crowd was happy to gather under normal conditions for the first time since January 2020, but also because they’re expecting a good year, even if sales temper a bit from the COVID highs.

“I think everybody’s expecting the momentum to carry us to a good but a normal good strong year,” Mondi said.

Next year’s The Pool & Spa Show takes place Jan. 23-25, 2024 at the Atlantic City Convention Center.