Bassmaster Elite Series & Wrapped Boats

[rmcollins3]

Has anyone else noticed that on almost all of the televised Elite Series events that the anglers are still running the Triton boats with Bassmaster's sponsors (Cialis, Toyota, Mercury, etc) wraps? I thought the anglers were going to get their sponsors on TV by running their own wraps during the highly televised events.

It seems they are only using their own wrapped boats on the first couple days of the tournament and then switching to BASS boats on the final days. Seems like a shoddy deal to me that these anglers have to go to all this trouble to get their boats wrapped to gain this "identity" only to have to use a different boat on the final day.

For instance, I know KVD is sponsored by Nitro and Bass Pro Shops, but at both Amistad and Sam Rayburn he was running a Triton TR-21X with a Mercury wrap during the final rounds. And he's on bassmaster.com running another TR-21X as well. What gives?? Looks like a great idea has gone south to me!

[Fishin' Dave]

that is exactay the way it works. FLW has a similar rule.

[sTony]

It's a shoddy deal all the way around.

sTony

[Vince Borges]

Hey Tony, if ya dont mind my asking, What happened to your Skeeter deal?

[DanO]

They run their own boats on days 1, 2 & 3. And on the final day, the top 12 run the Bassmaster Triton's.

Tony, you say that is a shoddy deal, but at least BASS lets the angler wear their own derby gear as opposed to FLW that used to make anglers cover their logos with Duct Tape in shame and now makes anglers wear generic clothing without any logos if an anglers sponsors don't coincide with theirs.

There are good and bad things about both organizations. TV revenue drives it all, so let's not pretend that anyone is a saint in this situation. They are both in it for their own corporate profit and the anglers who work it right make some themselves as well.

As long as both parties in the situation feel that it is of value, nobody gets taken advantage of. I do not hear any of BASS' Elite Anglers publicly saying anything but positive things about the experience, just as the FLW Tour Pro's are positive about their experience. There are sites that would publish that info if it came to light, and those sites are not saying anything.

They choose whom they will promote, we choose where we will spend our discretionary income. Most folks have made their allegiances with one of the organizations, or chosen not to support either. Competition is good, and there is obviously room for both FLW and BASS. But let's try to remember that neither one is altruistic, and neither one is a non-profit organization, and they both have things that are far south of ideal.

Dan O'Sullivan

[sTony]

DanO - Both situations are ridiculous. BASS forces you to spend good moeny on a boat rap that likely will get little notice and FLW forces you into non-id's clothing if it doesn't fit their sponsor list. Too bad the anglers don't truly get their act together and stop all the nonsense by banding together and putting an end to both scenarios. The PAA is the best vehicle to achieve that but apparently hasn't got the umpth to get 'er done.

Bottonline is neither BASS nor FLW would havea product without anglers.

Vince - I can't publicly comment about the boat situation.

sTony

[Hardshell]

be damned! When you get down to the point in the competition that either BASS or FLW require that you wear their clothes or drive their boat, I for one could care less. If I'm in that group I'm makin' money and if my sponsers can't tolerate that then maybe I'd better find some that will. Now guys that depend on sponser money to participate may have different opinion but last week I didn't hear many protests from guys that had to wear FLW shirts, hats, rain gear and floatation devices. They even made me get rid of my "GREENE" shirt and if anyone had a bitch it would be me, HAR, HAR!

Hardshell-Jailer

[sTony]

Being one of the company owners that had guys knocking on their doors to make contributions in the form of cash and dollars for rapped boats, I tend to see things a bit differently Steve. Every guy that called claimed what a bonus it'd be for my company to get such great exposure when the truth is maybe some competitors might see the boat but the national TV audience could go all year and never see it. The price tags were five figures for the guys calling that intended to fish BASS. So I was left wondering what would happen if I dropped that five digit investment just to see my angler on TV competing in a Bassmaster Triton boat. Why should guys like me make the investment under those circumstances? As it was I was aware of how this would play out and I balked at making that investment from the get go. And why demand a wrapped boat from your anglers if the sponsorship ends up to be meaningless like that?

sTony

[Hardshell]

I agree wholeheartedly Tony. Like I said, guys that go out and beat the bushes for duckets may look at this thing differently. I for one am really tired of the "what can you do for me" mentality we have now in the relationship between sponsers and participants. I guess I'm just not willing or able to put out the effort to market myself and to fish at the same time. I not naive enough to think that all them dollars just grow on trees either, so I'll just stumble along on my own dollars and have fun doing it.

Seeya

Hardshell-Jailer

[Guest]

Actually, I think a wrapped boat does a lot more when its off the water than on the water.

These days Vehicle advertising is bigger than ever. With the number of miles these vehicles are driving they are making visual impressions to hundreds of thousands of people and in some cases millions of people by the time the year is over.

I have done some research on Vehicle advertising and its getting to be very popular. Having a wrapped boat is the same as having a wrapped vehicle for these guys.

Its especially effective for fishing related industries. Is it just me or do you pretty much check out every boat that is being towed anywhere near you. I know I always take a gander at it and see if I know the person or see what kind of motor they are running etc. If I see Brent Ehrler hawling his Lucky Craft wrapped boat with his Lucky Craft wrapped truck I am sure he is making lots of impressions in the SouthEast to guys who don't really want to spend $16 - $18 on a bait. Maybe even that one site of "Hey the big boys are using it.. Maybe I should give one a try"

Granted I don't own a fishing related company nor do I have 5 digits to drop on an angler to wrap his boat.. but I think bigger companies who have marketing and advertising budgets and can write off the $$$ against their profits it wouldn't be a bad idea.. Especially if they are trying to make some headway in the South/SouthEast part of the country. Lets face it, even the event on TV how much do your really get to see KVD or Ike or Martens? Not a lot and not nearly as much as the number of "impressions" they make just driving down the highway or parked in a parking lot near a launch ramp!

Here are a few links that refer to Vehicle Advertising as a smart thing to do!

http://www.signindustry.com/finishing/a ... lWrap.php3

http://freebies.about.com/cs/allaboutfr ... date_2.htm

http://www.pizzatoday.com/features_arti ... JldDE4ODU=

http://www.vehiclewraps.ca/

(Granted in your case sTony they are in the wrong area.... you would be better off wrapping the boat of Dobyns or Jimmy Reese or someone who fishes the West Coast! )

Just my .02

[JJCJR]

In our case, we're a small company sponsoring a pro fisherman... Dean Rojas.

Dean is fishing the FLW, BASS, The BASSMASTER Classic and The BASS Elite series. On his boat we have anglersarsenal.com on both sides of the wrap and on the inside gunnels.

We are getting a lot of name exposure before and during, just not on the final day of the tournament...which Dean has made his way to a lot so far this season. At t he Classic Yahama put wrapped Dean's right in the middle of their 100 X 100 booth. Right there, in the middle of tens of thousands of dollars of glitz and glamor was our name.

We paid a lot of money to be on Dean's boat but it's paying off not only with the exposure it gives our website, but also the way Dean includes our name and the use of our products in his fishing successes. At Santee Cooper, Dean mentioned that his frog bite was not there, but he was still able to catch fish on the troublemake lure we make for him. To bad we let him down. He only caught 102 pounds plus for his four days using that lure....

Western Plastics/Angler's Arsenal are small companies. Having a pro like Dean catch fish on our products, showing them off on ESPN or BASSFAN or BASS Times makes for a lot more effective use of our advertising dollars than let's say print media only. Being a part of the boat wrap make that all possible

jjcjr.

[Guest]

I knew it was a good idea.

However, I still think advertising in good ole' Bass West isn't a bad idea either. Subscriptions numbers are on the rise.... Serious fisherman read it... Readers are heavily from the west coast but still from all over coast to coast. And as far as advertising rates go its the best deal in the fishing world. 1/10th 1/15th of what our competitors charge!

[sTony]

We're still kind of comparing apples and oranges when you look at the type of business anglers arsenal is compared to westernbass.com. Maybe I'm not seeing things straight, and lord knows I've been guilty of doing that before, but AA has products to sell to the broader market of anglers and this site is more regionally focused. The question for me would be does having that type of branding reach out to potential advertisers as well? I'm not sure.

sTony