What Do You Look for in a Fly Shop?
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Hey guys-
I have been very fortunate in the last couple years to have enjoyed The Creel flyshop in Knoxville, Tennessee. I’ve travelled to a lot of flyshops over the past few years, and they tend to fall into three types, which I’ll attempt to describe.
Type I
This shop is the kind of place that makes you want to take your boots off at the door. There’s a fire going in a rock fireplace on one end and a row of pontoon boats lining the wall of the other. If you need something, this shop has it, unless it’s cheap. While complimentary coffee and a couple of friendly animals are meant to make the place *seem* down-homey and accomodating, in reality this place was constructed as the wealthy owner’s tax shelter and you are on his turf. Employees tend to be the “I’ve travelled to the Bahamas three times this year, and Trevor is flying to Alberta next month” type.
While this kind of shop is a nice place to stand in one spot and look around in, you’d feel out of place striking up a conversation. Typically some flyfishing celebrity or other will just wander through (for a sizable fee) every other weekend, and the place has a 50-car parking lot to accomodate the crowds. These shops are most common in the great destination locations around the National Parks, but pretenders with all the negatives and few of the positives may crop up in most suburbs of large cities.
Type II
This type of fly shop is, in a word, a dirthole. Most of the material for sale here is on the tying wall, and all the good stuff was taken in the Carter Administration. If you are in the market for a Miami Dolphins-themed Wooly Bugger, you’re in luck, but otherwise, “you’ll need to mail order those size 16 hooks, son. They’ll be in when I get the Wapsi order out, which should be some time in about six months.”On the one hand you really feel for the guy behind the counter, who is typically an older fellow who has sunk his life savings into the place and is beginning to develop that hollow-eyed “oh what have I done” look. If he’s the good kind he’ll be real friendly and apologetic for his lack of good stock, “Just can’t get the big names to pay attention to a shop like this what with Diamond Chuck’s just 40 miles away.” If he’s the other kind (most are) he’ll be bitter and defensive and will try to sell you a Norweigen-made reel costing six times what its worth, and last year’s model to boot.
You’d like to support a shop like this, especially since it’s accessible being next to Payless Shoes in the Oak Ridge shopping mall and all, but you just can’t find anything there to buy except leader and tippet.
Type III
Type III shops are rare animals. I can count (maybe) two that I have ever visited. The jury is still out on one of those two. The other is Scott Roger’s The Creel in Knoxville, Tennessee.
Now before you think I am praising a home town boy, keep a few things in mind. I have only lived in Knoxville for two and a half years. I regularly travel, and I have never made a substantial purchase in The Creel. I am not an investor and the guy behind the counter in there may or may not remember my name.
The Creel is the kind of shop that I get the feeling used to exist all over. Its owner, Scott, is the jolly kind of guy we all imagine flyfishing personalities to be. Most aren’t. For one thing, Scott is young enough to have made a long-term go at his business. He’s a talented caster and fisherman and is regularly pictured (but never identified) in national fishing magazines. He could ace the casting instructor test with his eyes closed but opts not to take it.
The Creel is not an attractive flyshop. It resembles the dirtbag aspects of Type II shops in many ways. It is located in a shopping mall behind an Arby’s with an authentic Texas-Ten-Gallon sign. There’s an obligatory shop dog, Sadie, and a substantial amount of inventory poorly displayed and crammed close together. The inventory is the kind you want to buy. They are never low on the critical hooks (size 14 and 16 nymph and 18 dry) or leader (several types to choose from). They have offered all the major rod lines at one time or another, removing only those that don’t sell based on their own experience. Moreover, the shop has a long reputation, predating Scott by two or three owners, and a dedicated sales crew of young and old anglers.
The thing I like most about The Creel is simple: the chairs. There are four chairs right in front of the desk when you walk in. Those chairs are usually occupied, and the level of bullshit in the room can grow pretty deep when the phone is quiet and the unusual customers aren’t around. Most shops have eschewed this kind of groupie-ism out of the fear that its “regulars” won’t pay for the air they breathe. Not The Creel. They are fortunate to have a dedicated group of *wealthy* chair-setters. Abel reels and Winston rods pass the counter and into the chairs on a regular basis, where they usually sit for a day or two so people can admire the new item before it leaves with its rightful owner.
There’s a fridge behind the counter, and if you ask right you can get several illicit goodies, some of which Tennessee is rightfully famous for. I have never seen a customer ignored, never seen a customer hard-sold or steered to a rod that didn’t match his abilities.
In short, this is a shop that is, like Goldilock’s porridge, just right. It is swank enough to afford the best gear and do-dads like the Sage Casting Analyzer (claptrap though it is). Yet it is also humble enough to get by with foam-tile ceilings and a single, crummy tv. The mounts on the wall were all killed in the area, and some of them are a little the worse for wear. (There’s a state record there, too).
I like a flyshop that stays true to its humble, mountain roots, without shortchanging the consumer or charging him extra for the fine opportunity of shopping in a million-dollar log cabin. Very, very few businesses are run this way any more, but The Creel has been a longterm success. I think, in an increasing period of downsizing in the flyfishing sport and industry, that this is a model that should be emulated. We have enough Orvis-Endorsed Destination Locations to outfit every town in the Mountain West. We also have a lot of dirtbag hybrid flyshop-army surplus stores. What we don’t have is a rational balance between the two, not very often, and that is what I like to see in a flyshop.
What do you look for when you walk in a flyshop’s door?
Zach
I think a lot of the fly shops tend to focus so much on having the “top of the line” gear that they neglect to carry enough entry-level stuff. They may have a Cortland blister pack or two sitting back in a corner somewhere, but if you ask the sales staff about those rods, they often seem like they’re almost ashamed to have that stuff in the store.
The big-box stores (Bass Pro around here, and Academy Sports to a lesser extent) pick up most of the entry-level market, since they’re not afraid to sell a $75 rod and reel combo.
Where the fly shops lose out is that the entry-level items are a good recruiting tool for new customers (an analogy springs to mind of the proverbial crack pusher who gives away the first rock for free). If you can sell a person that first rod, you just might get them to come back later for an upgrade rod, flies, vest, tying stuff, and the gazillion other must-have items that keep us all flirting with poverty.
🙂 Type III and I’m lucky to have 2 shops like that in my area. Flyfishers Paradise in State College and Spruce Creek Fly Co. in Franklinville. They know your name, nice stock, no hard sell and the best advice when asked. They also have good fly tying classes. The giants of fly fishing can be encounterd at times. It’s a pleasure to go there even for a visit, but usually I wind up buying something. Silver Doc
I’m actually considering opening a fly shop. The Orvis store recently closed in town and now the only fly shop in Birmingham, AL is definitely a TYPE I. I hate to even go in there. I wonder if there is enough money in it to survive. I’ve been in retail for over 25 years and will be layed off on March 1st. ::) I was thinking about taking an older style home and making the first floor a fly shop and the top floor a cafe. People could shop and eat, or eat and shop.
I really liked the idea when I saw the Tommy Bahama store on St. Armand’s in Sarasota. Birmingham really needs something like that. Anybody know of any similar models where they combine dining and shopping?Hey JustFishing-
Nice to have you. I have thought along those lines myself, and the way I see it you could go two routes, both feasible. If you could get your hands on a historic home, you could turn part of the house into a flyshop (though I wouldn’t divide them by floors) and part into an eatery. Personally I would want to visit either a coffeeshop style place, perhaps with a general-interest books section (for the ladies and non-fishing husbands/buddies), some comfortable furniture, and the ability to make cold sandwiches.
The other option is to apply for a liquor license and make an upscale club-style atmosphere with leather chairs, cigars and pipe tobacco for sale, and perhaps some cards and pool tables.
I’d visit either one, and if it had a friendly, knowledgeable owner, I’d probably drop some dough too.
Zach
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