Posted by Jason Sealock on Fri, Nov 09, 2012 @ 08:00 AM
By Ronell Smith, RonellSmith.com
We’ve all heard the quote “There are two things you never want to see made: sausage and legislation.” As a country kid who grew up seeing his father make sausage from freshly slaughtered pigs and who spent some time covering politics as a newspaper reporter, I can attest to the validity of the statement.
Lately, however, I’ve been wondering if another process doesn’t need to be added to that list: pro staff/sponsor interaction. Anglers, for their part, feel squeezed from all sides, what with high entry fees, tough-to-come-by sponsor dollars and the ever-increasing cost of travel. Sponsors, too, are in a vice, struggling under the weight of sluggish sales, frequent top-down cuts to overall spending and marketing budgets that grow about as swiftly as the economy of Greece.
The pressure can make for an uneasy relationship, at best. Pros are often being asked to do more for less money, and at a time when they cannot afford to lose a sponsor; Manufacturers expect more, pay less and are quick to pull a deal off the table at the slightest sign of a balk on the behalf on an angler.
As I have said before, manufacturers (and tournament organizations) have the upper hand.
“What (pros) want and what they bring to the table is out of whack,” said the vice president of a Midwestern tackle company. “I have pros who haven’t won a tournament since...they were a co-angler asking me for more money. But if I ask him ‘Hey, I need you to work two shows for me in January and do a couple of appearances during the season,’ they look at me like I have a horn growing out of my forehead. Everything they do...I don’t care how small it is, they want me to pay them an ‘appearance fee’ if it’s not written into the contract. You have to get nasty with them sometimes...saying ‘If you don’t sign this contract, who does it hurt (more)? You? or me?”
The conversation above might seem like an anomaly to some, but it’s one of the variety I have at least twice a month. Admittedly, I see and hear things a little different from most media members, mainly because I cover a side of the business that is largely ignored. That doesn’t change the fact that the sponsor/pro staff relationship is, in many ways and for many companies, broken.
My three-step plan for fixing the fractured relationship includes...
1. Anglers have to drop the attitudes. No one wants to do more for less, but when you are negotiating from a position of weakness, your options are bleak. The only alternative is to chase after numerous small contracts, which can often result in being even more frustrated. If you signed on the dotted line, the expectation is that you fulfill your responsibilities, first and foremost.
If you desire to see your contract renewed, your job should be to go above and beyond, which means having the initiative to ask sponsors if there are additional duties you can perform, other areas of the company where you could be of use. A chief complaint I hear from anglers is “companies knock (your contract) back” after a bad year or two, so why not make yourself indispensable (at least as much as possible) by creating opportunities beyond on-the-water performance?
2. Anglers must understand that the game has changed. Long gone are the days when sponsors looked after a pro, even when his best years were behind him. No news there, right? What is news for some, however, is that even pros who perform on the water and off, through events and such, are on a much shorter leash than ever before.
As I have said numerous times, the name of the game is selling products, extending the reach of your sponsor’s brands, which is only significantly impacted if (a) you win a tournament and (b) you are already a household name. See the problem there: You cannot guarantee a win, and last I checked there is really only one household name (KVD) that moves products. That means companies are always on the hunt for the hot stick, not necessarily the best overall stick.
Instead of trying to be the best or the hottest stick, work to be the most marketable stick, which is greatly aided by your becoming the best salesman possible. Don’t believe me? Take a second and look at the list of Elite Series or FLW Tour pros who have not won a major event in years, if ever, but who continue to get new sponsors and hold onto existing ones. What’s the commonality? They can sell.
3. Companies need to be honest. I’ll admit that I’m a little bit “biased” when it comes to the whole angler/sponsor relationship. While I have an affinity for many of the anglers on tour, my business most often puts me in touch with sponsors, so I hear their side of things more frequently. One thing I do challenge sponsors with is the need for more transparency. They must, somehow, find a way to share with their pro staffs just where the relationship is at a given time.
I’ll use a recent example to make my point. While talking to a pro staff manager of a well-known company, the topic of contracts came up, and I asked about a popular pro.
“He hasn’t really done it for us like we thought he would. He’s done well...but when you look at what we are paying him...I cannot justify renewing (his contract.)”
Since this pro’s contract was not up for another year, I asked if the pro staff manager had shared his feelings with the pro.
“Things will run their course, Ronell. He knows what we are paying him. He knows he isn’t performing. When the time comes, I’ll make a decision based on the facts.”
Only it’s not so simple. See, the pros contract covers far more than tournament wins. And though he admittedly wasn’t getting it done on the water, he likely did think he was making up for it in other areas, such as product design, product testing and media exposure. That’s not how sponsor sees it.
The items above are just three of my ideas for fixing what I think is a broken system. I’m sure there are numerous others. I’d love to see your thoughts. Agree? Disagree?
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Posted by Jason Sealock on Fri, Nov 02, 2012 @ 07:55 AM
By Ronell Smith, The Tackle Insider
The news, what little of it there is, doesn’t appear to be good. You’ve talked to the vice president of marketing two times in person, visited several times via phone with the company’s marketing director/pro staff manager, coming away from each interaction with the sense that getting a pro staff contract was a mere formality.
They seemed happy with your knowledge of the product line, your passion for the brand, your willingness to do the little things like work shows, conduct local in-store demos and be a willing ambassador for the company. The deal was sealed, or so you thought.
Now, weeks after the last meeting, you have yet to hear anything, and to make matters worse, the web is lit up with news of other anglers who’ve recently signed sponsorship deals. You are left wondering “What went wrong? What could I have done different?”
Take a deep breath. It’s not entirely you. Assuming your intuition is correct, and you did all you knew to do, answering all of their questions, going above and beyond to allay any fears they had and making them feel confident you are the right person for the job, there is likely only one thing left for you to do: Make them aware that you are the only person for the job.
A remnant of the jobless economic “recovery” is the notion, held by many hiring managers, that there is an endless pool of qualified candidates chomping at the bit to get hired, so those charged with hiring are content to sit on their hands lest the person being interviewed convinces them that they are the perfect hire. So, today, it’s not enough to be the best candidate. You must become the only candidate for the job.
Chances are, during the interview process, you detailed how you’ve performed similar tasks for other sponsors; how each benefitted from the unique skills you bring; the job you’d like to perform for the company; and what your overall goals are. That’s a good start.
Now, for the finisher, you need to convince the person doing the hiring that you not only have done a similar job, but that you have done this job. Realizing that every hiring manager thinks his opening requires a special person with a one-of-a-kind skill set, you must make the case that you’ll walk in the door ready to do this job to his liking. (For more on the topic, read this Wall Street Journal piece.) Anything short of that, and he’ll sit on the fence until the right person applies the technique I outline below.
Use these tips to get him off the fence:
1. Request another chat. Even if you were told “You’ll hear from me soon regarding a decision, one way or another,” make every effort to get one last phone call or visit. To seem less pushy, sell it as an occasion to share with him some details that totally slipped your mind during the last visit. If that doesn’t sit well with you, come right out with “I sense you are on the fence about bringing me aboard. I’ve done some homework and I’d like to share what I think is a plan to take your company to the next level.” How can anyone say no to that?
2. Make a compelling case. In previous interviews, you made the mistake of talking about what you had done in the past. You likely talked too long and too fast and said very little that the vice president really needed to hear. This time, you’ll have a three-minute “elevator pitch” prepared, wherein you’ll outline, with in-depth detail, everything you’ll do, how you’ll do it and what the results will be. (You’ll need to have some inside information to make this work, but make whatever calls you need to make.) The goal here is to put you in the job right before his eyes, allowing him to see you in the role.
3. Get an answer. If you nailed No.2, the answer shouldn’t be long in coming. Either you convinced him or you didn’t, but whatever the case, you need an answer and you need it now. With that in mind, go all in: “You’ve heard everything I have to say. You’ve “seen” me perform the job. Is there anything that would prevent you from signing me today?” If you leave without an answer, you effectively have your answer.
I have used this exact technique several times in the past. It works. The answer you get might not be the one you expect. But it will get you an answer.
Ronell Smith, the Tackle Insider, has an extensive history in the fishing tackle industry and has relationships on all sides of the industry to be able to speak to all facets of manufacturing, buying, selling, promoting and growing fishing brands and products. To learn more, visit ronellsmith.com or follow him on Facebook and Twitter.Read More
Posted by Jason Sealock on Tue, Oct 25, 2011 @ 12:01 AM
Photo by Shaye Baker
By Jason Sealock
Are you sick of hearing about the Alabama Rig yet? Either way the rig is not going away. In fact, we suspect there’s going to be a lot more about it before the rumble dies down a little bit and we go about our normal lives in the bass fishing world. But since the firestorm that has exploded with Paul Elias and pretty much the majority of the top 10 anglers in the FLW Tour Open on Lake Guntersville last week, TheAlabamaRig.com has been one of the hottest fishing destinations on the internet with some reports putting it as high as 52,000 visits in just a four day span.
It’s fun when a new lure or rig takes off in the fishing world. But it’s not nearly the first time there has been a storm around a bass fishing lure, technique or rig. Just a few years ago there was this crazy wobbling jig called a Chatterbait catching huge limits of bass on Lake Okeechobee. I was down there while it was unfolding, first in the Everstart Series tournament Bryan Thrift unleashed it on. Then the next week was an FLW Tour event.
Scott Martin was smart enough to stock his store with pretty much the inventory of then Rad Lure’s Chatterbait. Before the event started, his shelves were bare. Those of us that bought a bunch could have, and many probably did, sold these Chatterbaits for upwards of $150 a piece on EBay as word spread like wildfire.
Then this crazy swimbait called a Basstrix hit the market and spontaneously combusted into a wildfire when Steve Kennedy whacked a bunch of huge Clear Lake bass on those and other swimbaits. Suddenly the stocks of Basstrix swimbaits were depleted and the demand drove prices up. Some retailers demanded minimum monetary orders to even be considered for buying some of the hot swimbaits.
The Alabama Rig is already started down the same path as these two baits. A big tournament is won on the rig and now there is a long backlog to even get one in your hands. Like both of these baits before it, this rig is hand made by a small operation, and they are working night and day to try to stay somewhere in the general vicinity of the orders pouring in.
Unfortunately where we see this headed is into the dreaded dark corner of the fishing tackle industry – knockoffs. Unfortunately several companies are probably already working on their versions of TAR. It’s the ugly truth that supply hardly ever meets demand in these situations, and everyone looks to capitalize on the latest and greatest. Not to mention mass production will drive prices down.
Patents, especially design patents are great and can protect your intellectual property, but that’s if you’re willing to defend it with time and money through the legal system. Most of these companies struggle there because they are doing all they can to meet the overwhelming demand and certainly don’t have time to go to courts to defend what everyone knows they created.
The next little buzz shooting off the side of this firestorm is the legality of the rig from state to state. In Minnesota, it would be illegal per DNR laws. In Alabama, it’s completely legal. In Tennessee there is a conference meeting going on and a decision is being made as early as today on whether to allow it. There is a bit of grey area in Tennessee, as is probably the case in several states. There is a rule in the books limiting umbrella rigs for trolling to one hook if the hooks are larger than size No. 6. The umbrella rig is defined as any array of 3 lures or baits or more on one rod. But that was made for trolling.
No one ever considered casting an umbrella rig that can weigh more than 5 ounces.
Another discussion we’ve had the last several days argues whether tournament organizations are going to continue to allow the rigs in their tournaments. This is where there is a tremendous fracture of opinions from the pros, weekend anglers, industry folks and biologists we’ve talked to already. For the sake of keeping this our opinion, we won’t name any names. Again these are just topics to consider spurring some friendly conversation over what is going on here with this new rig.
On the one hand, folks are excited about what the rig has done thus far. A BFL Regional was won the week before on it. Now a major professional bass fishing tournament has been won on it. In both cases, the talk before the tournament was how tough the fishing would be. At Guntersville, many of the top pros thought going into the event that 12-14 pounds a day would be good. Then the winner averages 25 pounds a day. Guys go from catching 11 pounds on the first day to catching 20-plus-pound stringers the last two days.
That excitement around tournaments can be hard to come by at times. However, what will be the opportunity cost? What are we giving up as a tournament fishing community by doing this? Some have argued that the sport of it goes away when guys can throw as many as they want and just seine the bass off of locations. It’s not quite that simple though. You’re not going to just tie one on and all of the sudden catch loads of bass everywhere you cast it.
It’s a situational bait. Our theory, and many of the pros have backed us up on this, is that the bigger bass are suspending off of shallow areas and breaks on a lot of fisheries where it’s working. These bass are ordinarily hard to catch because they don’t respond well to “one lure” coming through that suspended area. They have been conditioned through pressure and catches to avoid those single lures in their suspended zone. However it’s almost like those fish that are programmed not to chase that one bait, accept that the Alabama rig is a school of baitfish. It’s like it removes their inhibitions because there is no way that many fake lures can be coming by at one time.
Trolling was removed from tournament bass fishing long ago. We’ve often said the same should be done for walleye. Live bait as well. But that’s a topic for another day. But the essence of the removal of trolling was to pit skilled anglers against the bass with nothing but one bait and line between them. Not just riding around until they happened onto a group of willing fish. It forced guys to lock onto spots more, run patterns more and develop casting abilities to reach places others missed.
It takes determination to cast TAR all day with five 3/4-ounce jigheads, swimbait bodies, and the rig hanging at the end of your line. The baits weigh more than 4 ounces together, the rig weighs 3/8 ounce. Just getting it out there is a chore. Then doing that hundreds of times throughout the day is like chopping wood for 8 hours. That is a test of conditioning and skill in and of itself.
And it’s not going to work everywhere in all situations. One angler had an astute observation today that he shared.
“I’m sure the buzzbait caught a sick amount of bass when it first hit the scene,” he said. “Guys were probably mopping up the fisheries with it and just pillaging all the bass around for a time. But eventually the fish got somewhat conditioned and it’s not nearly as easy to fool them on a buzzbait as I’m sure it once was.”
So how long will this be THE WAY to catch them? Who knows. As soon as other methods out produce it when a bunch of the field was employing it will be unique to see. That may signal the fire is finally under control.
The final problem that often comes with rigs that work so well like this for a time is you’ve given folks a better tool to rape and pillage fisheries, especially those who would poach. We can remember seeing videos of some guys piling up bass and filleting them in sickening amounts on fisheries like Guntersville, Falcon and Amistad. We hate to think a rig that has had so much great positive energy for the sport right now would go that direction, but it’s fair to at least consider it.
What we did see as a spark of positive energy for the tackle industry is that you’ve got to buy an awful lot of baits to keep that thing rigged right and running true. Elias was going through the shad tails, other anglers reported catching 50 or more keepers a day on it when they thought 12 pounds was going to be good in practice.
One angler told me today, “Jason, if I had tested it and thrown it in practice and figured it out earlier, I guarantee I would have had 100 pounds for four days. It made that big of a difference.”
Strong testimony for the hottest rig going in bass fishing.
We hope Andy Poss gets his just deserve in this whole process and that we’re privy to another great situational tool, in this case bass suspending around shad, for a while to come. Hopefully no one will make snap and rash judgments, and we can all enjoy fishing as we always have with new lures and techniques while they’re hot without fear of damaging our fisheries or our sport’s great integrity.
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Posted by Jason Sealock on Sat, Jan 22, 2011 @ 09:54 AM
In response to a request by Growth Energy under section 211(f)(4) of the Clean Air Act, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has partially expanded their earlier waiver to allow fuel and fuel additive manufacturers to introduce into commerce gasoline that contains greater than 10 volume percent ethanol and up to 15 volume percent ethanol (E15) for use in model year 2001 and newer light-duty motor vehicles, subject to several conditions.
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Posted by Jason Sealock on Tue, Nov 30, 2010 @ 02:55 PM
Posted by Jason Sealock on Tue, Nov 02, 2010 @ 08:58 AM
The PressofAtlanticCity.com is reporting that that EPA has postponed its ruling on the proposed ban on lead in fishing tackle oddly enough until after the elections. Dale Kermey, a spokesman for the EPA, was quoted as saying the decision has been postponed until at least Nov. 15 and potentially longer.
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