Ultimate Fishing Show Novi Michigan Rock Financial Showplace Jan 8-11 , 2009

[McCarter]

Had a good time at the show.  All 4 days ( 5 if you cant setting up Wed night ) were a little different for us but it was a good time.

Thanks to everyone who stopped by and shot the shoot with us.  It was good to see you guys and gals and it was nice to meet some new people.

We got to meet a bunch of our customers in person which was very cool.

I have a couple funny storys from the show.  Chris had ordred a banner to go on top of our PVC and peg board display we made.  He told the guy we needed a 15" x 4 ft banner and they guy misunderstood him and made a 4 ft x 15 ft banner.  needless to say when chris went to pick it up he was a shocked when the guy brought something that big out.  He brought it to the show anyway not knowing what we were going to do with it.  So after day 1 was over, it was suggested that we take it up to the top of the bleachers on lake ultimate and hang it up.  so we did.  The next morning the show manager met us at our booth early and asked if the giant red banner on the bleachers was ours.  I told him it was and he said "Ok, just wanted to know.  Anyone with oysters enough to put something that big up without permission is ok in my book" and smiled and walked away.  We were half expecting a bill when were breaking stuff down sunday but never got one.  That was cool.

Second interesting story.  Being the marketing genius that i am, i thought it might not be a bad idea to hire a little help in the form of Hooters waitresses.  I had one booked for Saturday but she ended up not showing up.  So we went up with a good sized group Saturday night and i told another waitress what happened and she asked if she could do it on Sunday.  Of course i said yes, and 5 minutes later she came up with her other friend and asked if they could both  come down and they would each take less money to do it.  No brainer.  So sunday we had to very pretty young ladies passing out coupons for us and pulling groups of guys into our booth.  It ended up costing us $150 total to have them both there for 5 hours and we did $80 in sales that day.  So we missed our mark by $70.  What can i say, i truly am a genius.

Either way, we got our name out there in a big way over 4 days.  For a minute there i thought we were going to sell out of all our jigs.  I tied up between 50 and 60 and i think we had 15 or so left so i guess we can say that was a hot item.  And the gobys went fast on saturday and pretty good on sunday.  We only brought about 20 bags of sticks and i think there were only 5 or 6 left so it was a good show for us.

It seemed like KD Outdoors did good, too.  there booth was pretty packed most of the time.  He had some sick deals on rods and reels and tackle.  He was blowing out some ice shelters as well and they were all gone by saturday.  

Terry at Lunch Money didnt get a break for 4 days.  He was slammed non stop.  He had some crazy deals and people were buying like crazy.  

The best part of the show for me was having people come up and tell us how much they like our stuff.  We got a lot of really nice compliments and quite a few pats on the back.  that made me feel good.  

I meant to buy some stuff while we were there but by the time everything was winding down on sunday people were already packing up so Wayne I will order some of those new perch tubes soon.  Mike at Mikes Rx, you will be seeing an order from me and from Chris soon.  And Duane from Tournament Ready Tackle, we will be talking to you a bunch this spring.

Thanks again to everyone who came by and really made doing the show a great experience.

See you at the Wonderland Extravaganza in a couple monthes!

McCarter himself

P.S.  Chris, post some pictures.

[djkimmel]

nice censorship there Kimmel (melonies) LOL.

Glad you like it... guess if I was running a forum for a bunch of Harvard mathematicians, I wouldn't need the super sneaky running-in-the-background censorship program, but alas... I'm running a forum for a bunch of bass anglers (I WAS wondering what the hey was a melonie )

[Bender]

It was great to talk to everybody there and I apologize to a few people who I saw but didn't get a chance to talk to. Here's our big banner that came in a few hundred dollars over budget hanging at Lake Ultimate:


and our lovely "helpers" the from the last day:


I never did get to walk around the whole show and I missed Wayne's booth but I will be sure to get some of those tubes before the opener as well as some of Terry's Lunch Money color. I got a chance to stop by Mike's and get only one C-Flash and got a couple rods at huge discounts too.

[skeeterman190]

 Well as TCook said what a day, we got blasted over here on the SW side and it was just dumb too even think about making that drive. I wish I wouldve but im glad im still alive. I dont care what anyone says Brian, that was a marketing genuisis idea. Hooters girls cmon. Im sure everyone would much rather see them standing there than me or some other guy! Sorry to Ralph from Wonderland also i know you hooked us up. Ill keep in touch and hit the Grand Rapids show.( good to hear from ya the other night.)The banner priceless!!! Even got KVD in the picture!!!!!-skeeterman-

[Cheetam]

Hey Chris, send me that photo of the banner with KVD.  That's my boss and his son talking with him.  They might want a copy.

[WayneC]

Hey Brian...nice save on the banner!  That is got to be in the top 10....no, at least in the top 5 for all time saves for the crazy stuff that happens getting ready for a show.  That's a hole-in-one with thousands of witnesses and a story to be told for all time.  It's the one that didn't get away!  Kudo's!