OVER THE HILL GANG

September 13, 2010

My husband Trav mentioned last week our trip down to West Yellowstone for the FFF Fly Fair, which would have been the week just before the Labor Day weekend. I’m not associated with FFF an more and so I have no way of knowing how they decided on that date, but it pretty much assures there aren’t going to be very many young people (as in kids) in attendance. And there weren’t, and it didn’t seem like there was much aimed at them either.

It is always great to see old friends, and there were a few that we recognized - in fact it was especially nice to see Al and Gretchen Beatty at the tying table. They are old friends and long-time Sponsors here BT’s Fly Fishing Products - just really good people. They also attended the Idaho Fish-In a while back and did a terrific tying demonstration one evening. We’re really blessed to have such great folks as part of FAOL.

I did get to meet Lyle Graff the new owner of Rite Bobbins. They are a new Sponsor; we just don’t have their page up yet. Lyle is a retired fighter and airline pilot, just a delight to spend time with. If you haven’t checked out the Rite Bobbins, please take a look: www.ritebobbin.com

The big guy couldn’t be missed, ‘Don O’ known as Fantasy Fly Company, also a Sponsor on FAOL who brings you 'Rope Dubbed Flies'. Several of our folks have comments they never quite got the hang of dubbing, much less doing very much of it. Don’s method made believers out of them.

I got to see Cortland’s newest entry into the Ready to Fish market. A very nice 5/6 weight, 4 piece combination, rod, reel, line, leader case the whole deal. Tom Harman is the Regional Sales Manager for Cortland and just a terrific guy. We’ll have one of those outfits for the Monthly Drawing later this year. 

Had a very nice conversation with the Hardy & Greys Limited representative there, I had expected to see Jim Murphy who you might remember was the man who started both Redington and Albright. Jim wasn’t there, but John Shaner was and represented Hardy nicely. 

Actually I was surprised by the companies who were not there. No Sage, G Loomis, Orvis, Redington, Albright, Elkhorn, or St. Croix. That doesn’t leave much for rod companies. I can certainly understand with the Denver show coming up next week. There is only so much time and money in this economy for sure. 

We are not attending the Denver show, and frankly I’ve probably attended my last one a couple of years ago. I have never felt very comfortable at the shows (not that we weren’t made to feel welcome) but once we weren’t working the show for a company (Gatti) it just didn’t seem right to be there as Media and take the time away from the people who were there to sell their products to answer our questions. We certainly aren’t buyers, so they aren’t going to make any money from us.

We did usually take photos of new products and sometimes the various Sponsors booths, but it was a big expense for us without any pay back.

We usually did a pick of the show, and one year when we weren’t there the late Al Campbell picked the best of the show for us. That was sure a fun time, but it was a long time ago, which unfortunately reminds me that we really are the over the hill gang. I noticed it at the FFF Fly Fair, mostly grey haired people, not just the men either. Some of the fly tiers were younger, but most had grey hair. Very, very few young folks at all.

A few years ago one of the head guys at Sage said if we didn’t get some more young people into fly fishing they were going to be sending their new product catalogs to the convalescent centers, (old folk’s homes). We’ve been doing our part, too bad Sage didn’t choose to continue supporting us.

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