May 25th 2014, 06:15 PM
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#138 |
Apr 2009 Edgar, WI Cervid: deer |
I could be way off the mark here in my thoughts, but I have a theory on what took place with hunt ranch prices. At least from what I saw over the years here in WI.
At some point the number of growers (non hunt ranch owners) started growing at a pace faster than hunt ranches were adding new clients. Supply and demand dictated that prices being offered to growers started to decline slightly. However the real hit came when many growers decided that they would start their own hunt ranches. The theory was that they could guide a few hunts each year and make more off their bucks they were growing than what hunt ranch owners were offering to pay. I was in fact one of these people. I and another guy started our own hunt ranch. However I will firmly state that we fought a very hard fight to keep our prices in line with what was the average at the time we started offering hunts. It was NEVER our intention to gain our start-up clients by undercutting the existing hunt ranches. We didn't need to do this as we were prepared to start out slow and grow. If we sold only a couple of hunts the first year or two that would be fine.
However there were many of these start-up ranches that started around the same time as us that set out to find clients by undercutting the prices at existing ranches. I myself heard one guy justify it by saying he was, still making more than he would for his bucks if he sold them to another hunt ranch. What then happened was a constant and steady slide downward of prices as each old, and new ranch fought to keep their current clients and find new clients to fill the void of those lost to cheaper places.
Suddenly there became a negative supply and demand issue between hunters looking for hunts and hunt ranches offering hunts. That negative issue further decreased the prices of hunts.
I recall Bill, my partner in the hunt ranch telling me, "We can't keep our prices at $20k for a 200" buck because guys are telling me they can get them cheaper at........" ( I will leave out the names of these cheaper ranches as that is no longer important )
Soon we were dealing with clients showing us other ranches that were selling 200" hunts for $5k and even as low as $4500 each!!! We refused to lower our prices to that point and finally stood our ground.
I will make note that these start-up ranches that come online and were slashing prices were of all sizes. Big and small, fancy and basic. At some point competing with these places became impossible and we were left to just accept that we would lose some and keep others. We were fortunate because we kept some quality clients based on the fact that we provided a real product that they would in fact get an opportunity at. Unlike some places that said they had big deer and they didn't and tried to undersell the hunter a small buck. Also Bill and Jon do a fantastic job of entertaining the clients. Many have become friends as a result.
So if I did a good enough job of explaining myself I hope it will make sense to some of you.
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