The ATA (Archery Trade Association) show is an annual show that brings together every major brand in the entire industry. Members of the ATA are the manufacturers, distributors, and retailers. The show was in Indianapolis over January 8-10, 2009. This is our second year to attend the show and it was a blast. I took along my staff shooter Mark Johll and here is a synopsis of our experience.
Day One
The first day at the ATA started of as usual with a ton of excitement. The anticipation of being around all of the industry leaders, personalities, and seeing all of the latest and greatest gear pumps you up. We walked in and made our way to complete our first objective, which was signing up for a buying group, the NABA. Joining this group would give us greater buying power so we can bring better prices to our customers. After leaving that booth we headed out.
Paul Stokes hanging with Sarah Palin
Last year we were very regimented and stayed on a clear-cut schedule to make sure we visited specific booths. This year we are taking a different approach. We simply went isle to isle checking out anything that grabbed our attention. We also stopped at booths of brands we new we needed to check in with and figure out what products we were going to bring in for 2009.
Booths of interest that we spent time at were G5, AMS Bowfishing, Trophy Taker, Bohning, Slick Trick, and NXT Generation. NXT Generation is a booth with all kinds of kids toys related to archery and the outdoors. Mark shot me in the butt with a crossbow. So I shot him back. They actually have blow up targets with Velcro in the vitals so if the youngster hits the vitals it sticks and if they don’t it falls to the ground. We will have these products in our store next Christmas season.
Day Two
Day two would start a little late. We planned on getting to the show early to attend a seminar on bow fishing, but between breakfast, gassing up, and our drive we didn’t make it in time. Our first objective today was to go to the Bowtech booth and figure out our order. We had already heard through the grapevine that their accessory line, Octane, had come out with some really cool new product and Bowtech was introducing a new bow. We checked in with our rep and got in line to sit down with him. In the mean time we shot some bows and checked out all the new Octane accessories.
We took turns shooting the Bowtech product lines, which include Bowtech, Diamond, and Ross. It was extremely obvious that all of the attention was at their shooting booths. When you looked down the row of shooting booths, Bowtech was packed and all of the other booths were ghost towns. Bowtech’s new bow is called the Air Raid. The Air Raid is a high performance speed bow (IBO 336) that implements some new technology that produces a very smooth draw cycle and eliminates the perceived cam lean. Mark and I both agreed that this was a shooter.
Other notable bows that we shot were the Ross Carnivore, the PSE X-force, and the PSE Bow Madness XS. PSE had this crazy crossbow that attaches to an AR-15 lower receiver. It was wicked fast, wicked cool looking, and wicked expensive.
Mark opting not to wait 30 minutes in line for a picture with Tiffany
After hanging around the shooting booths and Bowtech all morning, we headed out to have lunch with Pronghorn Productions. Chris Kittleson of Pronghorn Productions produces a television show based and broadcast in Southern Wisconsin. Stokes is partnering with them to bring you products that work and Chris proves it out in the field and brings it to your television set. The rest of the day was milling around checking random products out. Product booths that we enjoyed were Lakewood Products, Heater Body Suits, G5 again (Tiffany was their signing autographs), Muddy, Prois, Vapor Trails, Scott’s Strings, Winners Choice, and Radical Archery Design.
After the show we hooked up with Walt Rayfield from Apple Land Sports Supply and Shane and Buck from Shane’s Outfitters in Medford, WI. If you live around Medford check these guys out. They are super cool guys. Walt took us to Hooters for some wings, beer, and eye candy. After some fun their we headed back to the convention center to go to “The Great Giveaway”. This is an event where they give away over $100,000 worth of prizes with the grand prize being a $35,000 African hunt all expenses paid including 10 animals, airfare, taxidermy, and shipping. Other cool prizes were a Bad Boy Buggy, several different hunts, and lots of different select brand prize packages.
Day Three
On Thursday we thought to ourselves “you think we could get done by tomorrow night and leave a day early?” Well now it was Saturday morning and we were wondering if we were going to get done before the show closed for good at 6pm. We still had not met with four of our major sales representatives and had several other vendor booths we wanted to visit.
First up we met with our sales rep, Dan Krueger, who represents among others Bohning, HHA, S & P Scents, and the coolest new quiver, Tight Spot. S & P makes really great scents and this year they are providing us with a freezer to put in the store to hold them. They ship their products frozen and guarantee you the freshest scents available. The new Tight Spot quiver is really unique. It mounts on the bow a unique way and is extremely compact (tight) to the bow. You will have to come in and check one out to get the idea, but it is cool. (arriving mid March).
Paul Stokes and Martin shooter/babe Laura Francese
Next we hooked up with Matt Katsfuss. Matt met us at the Martin booth where we hung out with Laura, had her sign some posters, and took some pictures. Wow what a cool chick. We headed over to Tru-Fire and placed our order. They have an awesome new release that we are pretty excited about. We continued on and visited other lines of Matt’s including Extreme, Limbsaver, and Trophy Taker. All these brands have some cool new stuff, most notably the new Limbsaver string suppressor.
Tom Marking, who reps Bear, Trophy Ridge, Primos and others, took us to lunch and then showed us around his booths. Tom had been in the store with Bear so we had already gone over all that stuff. Trophy Ridge has some killer new stuff and Primos has the coolest new attractant. They put doe estrus and buck urine together in little nuggets that look exactly like deer droppings. You put them in a mock scrape or a natural scrape and it keeps it “active” for 30-45 days. This is a great concept and potentially a valuable tool in keeping the local bruiser around your spot. I’m definitely going to try some.
Louie Zinn would be our last official meeting of the show and he is our rep for Easton, Apex, and a really cool rest that I can’t remember the name of. He was already in the store with Easton so we checked out the Apex and rest. The new rest is full containment similar to a whisker biscuit except the “whiskers” get out of the way on the shot like a fall-away. This is probably the coolest new rest we saw and you will have to check it out in person at the shop to gain an appreciation for it.
Mark Johll getting dwarfed by Tim Silvia
After thinking about our Bowtech order we had decided to go back and add to it. To our surprise the “make our show” moment was about to happen. In the Bowtech booth were Matt Hughes and Tim Silvia of the Ultimate Fighting Championships. These guys are both big bow hunters and are sponsored by Bowtech. They were both super nice guys, wehad fun chatting with them, and we took some pictures. I was a little bigger than Matt, but Tim made me feel like a dwarf. The man is a monster.
It was time for the mad dash to the finish. We went to Norway Industries, maker of the String Tamer, and found our new fletching, Fusion. This is the newest innovation in fletch technology and I can’t wait to share it with our customers. Finally we stopped by Ten Point Crossbows. After researching the crossbow market and talking to several experts, it was obvious that Ten Point was the crossbow we were going to bring in. We shot three different price point units, $500, $1000, and $2000. Each had great performance and features at their given value and the Ten Point reputation of reliability and customer service adds up to a product line that we can proudly carry and service for our customer.
Paul Stokes hanging with Matt Hughes
Our dreams of leaving Friday night turned into leaving as the show was closing and it made for a long road trip back to the mad city. It was a great show and we look forward to sharing the latest and greatest products with you all soon.
I find it hard to believe that there are archery pro shops out there that don’t believe in paper tuning. You will hear them say, “your arrows are grouping down range aren’t they?” When the client replies “yes”. The shop technician says, “There you have it.” The problem is, just because a bow and arrow setup is grouping down range does not mean that the bow is shooting to its full potential.
