Thank Frankel It's Friday – The death of the traditional motor show

But while all the usual press mob traipsed out to Paris, there were some notable no shows on the other side of the fence: Bentley, Aston Martin, McLaren, Rolls-Royce, Mazda, Volvo and Ford were among those who decided their money would be better off spent elsewhere. And while it’s perhaps not that surprising that small exotic car manufacturers might elect not to attend such a mainstream show, for Ford to reach the same conclusion is nothing short of shocking. Two of the top six best selling cars in Europe last year were Fords for goodness sake, with the Fiesta firmly anchored in the number two slot.

The problem is such behaviour is contagious. Of course the French will always turn up to their home show, but if there aren’t meetings going on right now at Vauxhall/Opel and others to debate the merits of returning to Paris in 2018, I would be somewhat surprised. And I can’t see the problem going away any time soon, and here’s why.

Conventional motor shows, where people flock to large halls to see cars parked, inanimate and mute are, in automotive terms, a dark ages relic. Look at pictures taken from Olympia before the war and Paris in 2016 and only the cars and colour have changed. But the world outside the show halls, the way people inform themselves about cars and even the way they buy them has changed out of all recognition.

Motor shows became popular because there was really no other way for people to look at all the cars they were interested in under one roof, and the flaws in the system – the absence of any impartial advice and the inability even to hear the cars let alone see them move – went either unnoticed or were accepted due to the absence of any alternative.

But now if you want to find out about a car you don’t need to go to a motor show and I am afraid you don’t even need to buy a car magazine: a few clicks on the mouse and you’ll find all the information and entertainment you could hope for about any model in which you might be interested, and quite a lot more besides. And no, the virtual world is no substitute for the real world which, of course, is where the Goodwood Festival of Speed and the Moving Motor Show come in where cars can be seen doing what they were designed to do.

Of course some conventional motor shows will survive – I can’t see the German brands abandoning their massive monument to their enormous industry any time soon, and I’m sure Geneva will survive for now because everyone likes going and it’s held on neutral territory; but elsewhere in Europe, Italy has no big show format, preferring smaller, more exclusive events like Villa d’Este and Goodwood is now the de facto British Motor Show. I expect I will be back in Paris in 2018, but if the turnout is not back to full strength by then – and I’d personally be surprised if it were – then I think the chances of it retaining its status as a division one motor show in future are small, and dwindling fast. And in the long term, I’d say the days of the conventional motor show format the world over are, if not over, then certainly numbered.