High Point furniture market’s biggest competitor just opened its winter market in Las Vegas.

Organizers are still preparing for a week’s worth of events, but one economist still wonders how productive that marked will actually be.

“Las Vegas is a huge selling point, but Las Vegas is also a city that people go to for fun, and so you got to wonder how much serious business is going to be conducted out there,” explained Mark Vitner, a senior economist at Wachovia.

Las Vegas launched its largest furniture market ever last year amid pomp and circumstance. Vitner says there’s been a lot of investment into that show, and High Point will certainly loose some of its share to the City of Sin.

The High Point furniture market’s biggest competitor just opened its winter market in Las Vegas, but one economist still wonders how productive that marked will actually be.

“Las Vegas is going to be some very tough competition because the manufacturing of furniture is moving to Asia or rapidly moving to Asia, and I think it’s a lot easier for folks to get from Asia to Las Vegas than it is to get here to Winston-Salem,” Vitner said.

But Greensboro’s mayor hopes the state can provide extra assistance to keep the local market strong.

“The furniture market is a hugely regional impacting economic engine for the Triad,” said Mayor Keith Holiday. “As mayor of Greensboro, I strongly advocate that the General Assembly focus very hard on that furniture market to not just help with transportation but any other ways that they can help with their funding mechanisms to support that market.”

Holiday says it’s important to keep the High Point market’s status within the home furnishings industry.

“Obviously it’s under a certain amount of attack regarding what’s going on in Las Vegas, and instead of shying away from that, we’ve got to take the opposite approach and boost it to such an extent that it solidifies it to its position in the worldwide market of furniture,” Holiday concluded.

But even the critics say with the new and expanded trade complexes and the no expense-spared openings, the Las Vegas market could become a fixture in the furniture industry.

The market started Jan. 29 and will run through Feb. 2.