The London Snow Show: 50 Years On
After returning to Olympia in 2025, the London Snow Show is using its landmark 50th anniversary year to build on that momentum, deepen audience engagement and explore what the next phase of growth could look like at Olympia for one of the UK’s longest-running consumer exhibitions.
For owner James Gambrill, bringing the event back to Olympia was about more than logistics. It was about reconnecting the show with the venue many in the industry still associate most strongly with its identity and history. “Emotionally, I genuinely don’t think that the 50th edition should be anywhere else,” said Gambrill. “Olympia is the home of the show. It’s where it feels right, it’s where the history is.”
He added that the experience of working with the venue team reinforced that decision. “They were incredibly supportive, but also genuinely excited,” he said. “We didn’t feel like we were just another show. It felt like they were very invested in the success of it and wanted to do everything they could to help us make it a success.”
For an event built around nostalgia, aspiration and seasonal excitement, that sense of place matters. “Olympia works really well from a transport point of view, it’s in the right part of London, and it already feels connected to that affluent ski audience,” Gambrill said. “But beyond that, it has the right atmosphere. The dual layers work really well because we wanted to bring back that show atmosphere – and being able to go up on the balcony and look down on a busy show floor is extremely important.”
He added: “The glass roof is also a massive drawcard. It gives you that natural light and that feeling of being connected to the outdoors, without having to worry about London weather.”
That atmosphere is central to what the London Snow Show is trying to deliver. More than a retail or booking environment, the event has long acted as a seasonal meeting point for skiers and snowboarders – a place to meet resorts and brands face-to-face, reconnect with friends and get immersed in winter, long before the first trip of the season. “For so many skiers, the show kickstarts their winter,” said Gambrill. “It’s that opportunity to come and immerse themselves in, as close to a ski resort atmosphere, as we can create in West London.”
The return to Olympia in 2025 also gave Gambrill and his team a chance to test what a modern version of the London Snow Show should look like. Their first edition at the venue under the current ownership offered useful lessons on content, flow and audience behaviour, which are now shaping the 2026 event. “What we learned last year is that people really want reasons to stay longer, explore more and feel immersed,” he said. “At times, if anything, we probably had slightly too much going on, so this year is about building on what worked, but doing it in a more structured way.”
That refinement is visible across the programme. The show will feature five live theatres, up from four last year, with a new destinations theatre joining the line-up. Speaker numbers are expected to rise from around 100 in 2025 to at least 120 or 125 this year, with Olympic athletes, instructors, tourism leaders and journalists all contributing.
The 50th anniversary is also being shaped directly by the audience and its people. Rather than deciding internally how best to mark the milestone, the team surveyed its database of around 40,000 visitors to find out which snow sports legends and personalities they wanted to see most.
That approach has led to one of the most anticipated elements of this year’s event: a special programme of snow sports legends and current stars, expected to appear in conversation with Ski Sunday’s Chemmy Alcott. Elsewhere on the show floor, the fashion show is returning for the 50th edition, alongside experiential features including the Alpine Bar, a virtual snowball fight and Santa’s grotto. The team is also exploring the addition of a high-tech ski simulator to give visitors a more immersive taste of the slopes indoors.
Looking further ahead, Olympia’s wider transformation opens up new opportunities for the show. Gambrill can already see potential for more destination-led activations, hospitality experiences and stronger links between the consumer-facing show and the wider snow sports industry. “The more we can tie in, the better,” he said. “There’s definitely an opportunity to make more of everything happening at and around Olympia and bring more of that energy together in one place.”
Longer term, that could mean the London Snow Show evolving into more than an annual exhibition, becoming a broader year-round community with Olympia as its focal point each autumn.
As the London Snow Show reaches its 50th year this October, that combination of heritage, audience loyalty and venue fit gives it something rare in the consumer exhibition space: a sense of history that still feels relevant. With Olympia once again at the centre of the story, the 2026 edition is not just a celebration of where the show has been, but a clear sign of where it could go next.
Originally published on Event Industry News. Source: https://www.eventindustrynews.com/news/the-london-snow-show-50-years-on?_sc=NjI0NTcwNiMxNzgxOTU%3D