Cameron Hanes - Keep Hammering Collective - KHC 083 - Jeremy Eldredge

Episode Date: June 28, 2024

Join us for a discussion with Jeremy Eldredge, director of marketing at Hoyt. Cam and Jeremy talk about Cam’s sponsorship with Hoyt, marketing in the hunting industry and more! Follow along: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cameronrhanes Twitter: https://twitter.com/cameronhanes Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/camhanes/ Website: https://www.cameronhanes.com Follow Jeremy: https://www.instagram.com/jeremyeldredge/  Thank you to our sponsors: Hoyt: http://bit.ly/3Zdamyv use code CAM for 10% off Montana Knife Company: https://www.montanaknifecompany.com/ use code CAM for 10% off  Black Rifle Coffee: https://www.blackriflecoffee.com/ use code KEEPHAMMERING for 20% your first order Sig Sauer: https://www.sigsauer.com/ use code CAM10 for 10% off optics MTN OPS Supplements: https://mtnops.com/ use code KEEPHAMMERING for 20% off and Free Shipping Grizzly Coolers: https://www.grizzlycoolers.com/ use code KEEPHAMMERING for 20% off Timestamps: 0:00:00 Intro: Sponsorships & What Jeremy Does for Hoyt 0:07:18 Marketing in the Archery Industry 0:10:38 Target Archery vs Bowhunting Influence 0:13:57 Bowtech Pro-Staff Cuts 0:15:30 The Most Powerful Social Media Source for Influencers 0:16:21 Brand Representation for Sales 0:21:57 Arrow Sound & Animal Reactions to Sound & Body Language 0:26:36 Jeremy’s Arrow, Blade & Bow Setup 0:29:16 What Sells Better: Aluminum or Carbon? 0:30:38 Ad Break 0:31:34 Draw Force Curve 0:34:37 Hoyt’s Pro-Staff 0:40:48 The Impact From Social Influencers & Archery Shops 0:45:04 Jeremy’s Thoughts on the Lift. Run. Shoot. Event 0:46:33 The Best Advice to Start Hunting 0:49:00 Too Many Hunters? Or are the Numbers Declining? 0:53:30 Social Media Algorithms 0:56:04 What’s Next for Hoyt? 0:58:27 Jeremy’s Best Idea for Hoyt & What Cam Could Do Better 01:02:14 Outro

Every step I take, I move my truth. Every time they tell me stop I use. Every comment hate that makes my feel. Gather up my energy and boom. I hear them talking, saying the way that I move it's so reckless. That is a part of my mind I've been blessed with. Giving my blood so I am relentless. This is a key Pammering Collective.

I'm with Jeremy. It's Eldridge. I don't know if I've ever really said your last one. I've read it a lot, but Eldridge. Yeah. Eldridge. Yes, sir. So, and you are Hoyt, what are you? Director of Marketing.

Director, ooh, here's a big wig. What about VP? When does that happen? Yeah, it's a good question. I don't know. Yeah, but director marketing, that works. So how can I get sponsored? Do you ever get that question?

Yeah, all the time. So yeah, I would think that like in your position, that's you're always getting reached out to, right? All the time. All the time. I was curious. If that's somebody's goal, what do they do? They got to sell bows.

Yeah. I mean, they got to sell bows. That's why we pay marketing money is to get a return, right? Right. I mean, that's the name of the game. Yeah. So however they decide to do that, whether it's have a podcast and be an awesome bow hunter and influence people or whether it's a, I don't know, a YouTube channel or whatever they do,

we got to be able to see a really good return. and then, yeah, it makes sense to work with them in some way. Yeah. I know it's tough because I've been the guy who wanted to, you know, you see, when I grew up, it was Chuck Adams and, you know, Larry D. Jones, Dwight Shoe, and I wanted to be a writer and wanted to be sponsored. That's like, you know, that's a dream. So I know what it feels like.

And when I first started, I first was an Oregon bow, and they were right here. in, what were they? They were out in Junction City. Yeah, Junction City. And so wanted to be, you know, whatever, shot Oregon. Then I shot an X-I legend, which I think Miles Keller shot X-I, so I wanted to be. That was good. Then I think I shot a high country.

I remember I wrote some letter to Mark Garcia. I don't even know where he's at. He's probably still in the industry, but he was at high country at that time. I didn't I wasn't selling bows you know to your point it's just like everybody wants to like jump the curve and get to the sponsor without having really earned it I hadn't earned it and then finally I started shooting PSC and their whole thing is like they they had commercials up that says you know it was something like we don't pay any of these people to shoot our bows and then I was in there and it was like well that was kind of screwing me a little bit but I don't get it because you do want people who will shoot your bow just without, you know, without getting paid, right? I mean, I guess that means they believe in it. And then, but then there's like, okay, so now I'm starting to pay my dues and earn, you know, some influence a little bit. I was writing for Eastman's. I had had done a book. And I was like, okay, I think I'm, I'm earning something. And then that's

what led me to Hoyt in 2005 is when I switched to Hoyt. Were you there? I just started. Oh, really? I remember when I remember when I remember, it all happened. And Mike Cooper at the time, the marketing director, he was so pumped. We got Cameron Haynes. Oh, nice. Yeah. So I remember that.

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. So that was a while ago. Yeah. 2000, almost 20 years ago now. Yeah. Yeah.

And what were you doing at that time? So I started at Hoy in the supply chain department. Yeah. I was doing purchasing. And a lot of the accounts I was handling were the marketing suppliers. And so I got to work with Mike a lot and his team. And after a year, year and a half, he's like, dude, you need to come work in marketing. And I'm like, I don't know.

I kind of like what I'm doing. He's like, no, no, no, Jeremy, this is marketing at Hoyt. Yeah. You love boe hunting. Like, don't say no to this. And so I was like, all right, I'll come try it. And 20 years later, here I'm still there. And we're, so you were, what were you doing at that time for marketing?

So I started out, I was doing pro staff and promotion coordinator. Mm-hmm. And so I had a lot of the tournament shooters. And I didn't have the bow hunting staff at that time, just the tournament shooters. I did that for, it seems like it was less than a year. And then I got, and then I became an assistant marketing manager. Did that for a little while. And then marketing manager.

And then I was kind of the ceiling for a minute because Mike was still there. Yeah. And I didn't think Mike would ever leave. I thought he was entrenched there. Right. Yeah. And it seemed like he was like the guy. Right.

Yeah. And then as things do, things changed. Mike left and opened up the next door. and then I became the director of marketing. And how's it been? It's been good. Yeah, I mean, it's definitely the next level of stress. Yeah.

Because now, I mean, as the marketing manager, you're managing what the director wants you to do, right? And you're given input. But at the end of the day, none of the decisions are really yours. Right. So there's no consequence to your decisions. Yeah, yeah. But now as the director, there's no one to look up to me. Like, that was a dumb move.

You know, it's all right here. So. Yeah. But it's good. I've got an awesome team. and Zach the president, he lets me do my deal. Yeah. So, yeah.

So I would think it's changed a lot because if you just think about the industry as a whole, you know, TV was kind of, it was everything. When you were talking about outdoor riders, that was it, man. We had a pro staff of outdoor riders and TV personalities. Yeah. That's where we were putting all our eggs is in those two baskets. Yeah. It's a lot different now.

Yeah, it's like, do you think it's, is it harder? Because at that time, so if you just say, okay, if I'm going to go TV, then you go, well, you know, Waddell, obviously, he's, you know, one of the most popular figures on Outdoor Channel. Yeah. So you could give him, you could write a big check and just be like, well, that's, he's going to sell bows. Yeah. And then now it's with TV, I don't even know where TV is now. I mean, what percentage of is it for you guys?

As far as our budget? Yeah. It's definitely a lot less, a lot less than it used to be. TV is just, I don't know, there's, it's just an older model. It still has its place. Yeah. Guys are still watching it. But with all the digital, you know, platforms now with YouTube and social, I mean,

you can just dial it in so much better. When you run an ad on TV, you're paying for it no matter who watches it and how many people watch it. Right. If anyone sees it, it could be on at two in the morning. You still paid for that spot. But on YouTube, we only pay when someone watches it. Yeah.

And we can target. who we want. We want this ad to run in the Midwest to people who like bohunting. We can dial it in and YouTube will hit that audience best they can. And so there's not really any, you know, wasted ad dollars. I mean, there are, but not like TV or it's just like, yeah, run some ads and hope for the best. And so it's much different now. Is it, do you feel like because you can dial it in more, or you have to dial it in more, do you think the return as a whole is better? Yeah. Is it? Yeah. Yeah, I think so.

We can we can tailor our ads. We've got an ad with you running right now in the West. We're just finishing up an ad with Waddell that we'll run in the east. You know, and he's shooting a white tail in the woods. You're shooting a bear out here in the West. I mean, it just speaks to the audience a little better. Is it like when you say run an ad, is that on social? It's on YouTube. Oh, on YouTube. Oh, gotcha. And we run it social on social too.

Yeah, because you can't you, or let me think, how do I? I do it. Maybe I do, maybe it's YouTube. Yeah, because I got somebody who does like the targeted ads like for the truck giveaway. I can, instead of going to the same person, I can go to, you know, a lot of people do these ads and it gets to the same person a hundred times. Right. But if you got the right guy running it, it's going to new people each time or new demographics. Yeah. Yeah. It's just crazy. This, I don't know how powerful it is to be able to advertise to whoever you want, wherever you want. Yeah. do a pretty good job at it. Right.

And so as a whole, how is archery industry doing? It's doing good. I mean, it's, you know, we hear a lot that it's a shrinking market or, you know, there's fewer hunters. And I think that's true, but I think those that are in it, especially in our circles, right, where people are following you and people are following Hoyt, it's way easier to be more engaged than it ever was in the past because there's more content, more places to follow. So those that are engaged can be way more engaged than they could have been 20 years ago where they waited. They'd have to wait for the next magazine to come out, right? Yeah. To get new content.

Yeah. Now they can go every day and get new content wherever they want. So I think it is a shrinking market. I mean, we were just looking at Google Trends. I don't know if you've ever looked at that. You can type in Google Trends. It brings up a Google Trends website and put in any term you want. And it shows from 2004 when they started tracking it to present day what the trend line is.

And unfortunately, you put bohunting in there and it trends down. Really? Yeah. Okay. So there's one indicator, you know, licensed sales is another indicator. Just sales is another indicator. So it's definitely, you know, it's not in its heyday as far as number of people participating. Yeah.

But those that are participating, I think are participating at a higher level than they did years ago. Yeah. And I mean, Hoyt as a business still kicking ass. I mean, because when I think of it, and I don't know numbers, but it's, you know, Hoyt, Matthews, and then probably what, PSE is third? Yeah, maybe. Yeah. But I agree. When you're talking about high-end bows, the conversation's always about Hoyt and Matthews. And so do you guys look at that? Is there your only competition? We always refer to them as our main competitor. Yeah. There's other competition. We don't want to lose track of them, but Matthews is our main competitor.

Yeah. For sure. I was curious about this too. I had Levi Morgan on, which I got a lot of respect for and he's such a great archer. But how does like, I mean, so Hoyt and Matthews, how is the market target compared to hunting? I've never heard this yeah so target archery in the states most target shooters are also bow hunters not all of them there's some that just enjoy target archery it's just their hobby but the bowhunting influence it's undeniable in the states it's carried over into target archery guys love

bow hunting and they really love shooting their bow how do I shoot my bow year around oh there's target archery so I'm going to get into target archery and shoot leagues at my local clobiling club and then from there, man, this is fun. I've heard about this Vegas shoot and they go to Vegas and shoot, right? And so in the States, target archery is healthy and it's a lot of carryover from bow hunters. And then internationally, target archery, that is the game, right? They're not bow hunters. Not really hunting.

Yeah. And then within that recurve archery is more popular than compound archery. Okay. And a lot of that has to do with the Olympic influence, right? So if you're into a sport, whatever the highest. level you want to attain to get to in archery that's the Olympics and so and this year's an Olympic year we're pretty excited there's always uh we've had we won more medals with there's been more shooters with hoight bows win medals than all other bows combined yeah since the reintroduction of

the Olympics into the archery into the Olympics in 1980 that's pretty sweet so yeah so we have a pretty proud history there in the Olympics so we're looking forward to later this summer seeing how our shooters do yeah is it brady or yeah brady or yeah Yeah, he's, he's going to make it, right? Yeah, he's earned his spot. Yeah. He's pretty, he's iconic. He's won a bunch.

Yeah. Yeah. And he bow hunts, to your point. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I've always just wondered about that because you see it's, it's different because you, it's score wise, but you see the guys like the Levi or all your shooters too, but with the big checks.

Yeah. You know, hunting, nobody's with a buck with a big check. Right. Yeah. So you don't really, you don't really know how it compares. You know, you see the money in Target, but you don't see how that correlates to hunting. Right. So I was just curious how that broke down.

Because in my world, because I don't give a fuck about Target, it's all hunting. So I'm always like looking at like skewing it saying, oh, it's got to be hunters that carry this thing. But I never know. Yeah. No, I mean, as far as our market, I mean, it's 90% hunting bows. Yeah. Yeah. So it is bow hunting that carries it.

And within bow hunting, it's the white-tailed world that carries it, right? If there wasn't a white-tale deer, then you'd be tough. Your checks would be a lot smaller from Hoy. I'll tell you that. So you're saying hunting is 90%? It's probably at least 80, but it's at least 80% of our. Okay, so I'm right. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I enjoy, even though I don't do it, I enjoy watching those guys. I enjoy watching, you know, competition is always fun to watch. Yeah. And I follow along with, you know, like, is it boaty? Right? Yeah. And I mean, he's, so I know that story. And I think he hunts too. But I mean, he's just more of a phenom shooter. He's so good. Yeah. Yeah. And then I wonder. So I was curious about this too. Like, BoTech had this big thing where they cut all their pro staff, except maybe Paige. Yeah. Like she's a female shooter. But they cut like, I think Kim Gillingham and who's our other Kyle? Yeah. Kyle. Yeah. Yeah. What was that about?

Do you think just sales? Yeah, I think it's budget related. I mean, tournament shooters, you know, they can be expensive. And if it's only 10% of the market. Right. So if you're not getting a strong ROI on your target bow cells specifically, and you can't see a correlation in your hunting cells from their influence, then yeah, after a little while, it can be like, man, we can't keep doing this.

Yeah. And so I think that's probably, you know, what it boiled down to. It's like paying a lot of money. didn't pay off like we thought it would. We got to make the right decision for our business. Yeah. I saw there's a lot of people up in arms about that, but business is business.

No matter, even if it's something we love like archery, still business. Right. You know, so I mean, I get that, you know,

Botech, they can't just be paying people just to pay them, but I felt bad for these guys were still winning, you know? Yeah. I mean, still doing their job, and I wasn't good enough for whatever reason.

but I think they got picked up by somebody else. Yeah, they, they're doing fine. Yeah, it's, it's, yeah, the archery and the hunting industry is, is pretty cool. So where, I mean, what's the most powerful, do you think like YouTube or is it podcast nowadays? Yeah, for me, in my opinion, it's YouTube. Yeah, just the amount of content out there and the number of people using that as their search. engine to find out information or to be entertained or whatever. Yeah.

And then podcasts, you know, probably right behind that just because they're so convenient. You can listen to it anywhere, right? Driving, working out, working in the yard, whatever you're doing. It's easy to put one on. And so those are just because of the convenience of them. And if you've got a following, they're going to, every time there's a new one, they're going to listen, right? We all have those of ours.

Like, you know, we know every Wednesday, new one's coming out or whatever it is. we look forward to it. So yeah, I think they're definitely right after probably, you know, close second after YouTube, in my opinion. And then what do you think results in sales, like hunting and showing like a perfect shot or is it like technical stuff? Man, it's a million dollar question. Yeah. If I knew exactly what it was, my job would be easy. But it's a mixture.

I mean, we've always been known as an innovative company, right? Hoyt from 1931 when Earl Hoyt started Hoyt you know he left his job as an as an engineer at a McDonald Douglas make you know engineers and an airplane engineer and he left that to start Hoyt and and his ideas and his engineering mind really took archery to a different level there's a lot of patents that he has that has are still being used today in archery almost you know 100 years later So we're an innovative company. We're an engineering company. It's kind of what our brand is known for.

But that can also not land well with people who don't really care. They just love bohunting. And so for those people, you've got to be, you've got to hit their emotions, right? The hunt, the perfect shot, like carrying out the rack, whatever. So it's a mixture of continuing the brand innovation message. And then also this is why we do what we do. man we love this we love being in the woods we love the early mornings whatever it is yeah i well that's you know hoit's always been so aesthetic as far as just looked so good that's what brought me to hoit

from psa in 2005 is you just look at the riser and the cams and it just seemed like it was higher quality yeah it's just that look for maybe the engineering but and it's kind of i mean that's stayed true to your point probably i was always that case i just didn't notice until 2005. But, yeah, Hoyt's always had just like such a good looking bow. And then, you know, nowadays, you know, me and Joe are always talking about how can they keep getting better. You know, I think you guys saw that or put up a clip or something. But, you know, I was talking about the little, little support for the cam. So it's not in the dirt. But it's so many little things. And it's like you wonder, where's the ceiling? I know. It's pretty fun. But like,

when does it end? I don't know. I mean, at some point, sometimes I feel like we're there. Like, bows haven't got faster in 10 years, right? In years, yeah. It's like 340 is the number.

I mean, some of us get to 344 and some of us are 3.42 and some of us are 340, but it's kind of the number, right? To get any faster than that, the bow just wouldn't be shootable. Wouldn't be, you wouldn't want to draw back. The draw force curve would be so horrible. So speed-wise, we're there.

Now I think what we're folks, focusing on is just the experience of the whole experience of using the bow. So a few years ago, we came out with inline accessories where instead of just, you know, putting the side on the side of the bow and the rest on the side of the bow and now the bow is a little bit, you know, lopsided on weight. We figured out way we put the side on the front of the bow. The rest is in line with the bow. That leaves, that lets the quiver come in tighter.

We move the stabilizer position down lower on the bow so that a shorter stabilizer, lower and further forward so that a shorter. order stabilizer now does what a longer, heavier stabilizer used to do. So just all these details to make using the bow better. The bow is now more balanced. Overall, it's lighter weight. So we're chasing those kind of improvements. And then also just shock and noise, just chasing that as hard as we can.

And, you know, making it as quiet and as dead in the hand as possible. And then the other thing is just the draw. Like, you know, we have a campaign this year. 70 feels like 60. Oh. And that's, we keep hearing that when people shoot our bows. They're like, is this really 70? You know, the total archery challenge there at the booth, drawing it back.

Is this a 70 pound bow? Yeah, 70, man. And so the smooth draw, the inline accessory so that everything balances better, quiet, dead in the hand. I mean, we're just making the whole experience better because the most noticeable thing would be speed, but we're maxed out for now. Yeah. That was just such an easy marketing. bang for everybody.

You just put that number up. And then your job was easy. But yeah, now it's getting a little tougher. One thing I do notice is, you know, we set up 20 people with brand new Hoyts yesterday. And every person shooting through paper

and out on the range is just so quiet. Yeah. That's what nowadays, that's what stands out to me is, and also then when you shoot them, you know, the bow doesn't do anything in your hand. But it's pretty dead there,

but they're so dang quiet. And that's, I mean, That's such a big improvement. It's pretty cool. Yeah. Our engineer's been working hard on that last few years. They invested in this sound room.

It's, I don't know, maybe as big as your workout space here. And the whole thing is covered in sound foam. And it's weird. You go in there and close the door and it's like, it's an eerie feeling because you can't hear anything. Right. All the noise from the outside world is shut out. It is complete silence in there, which we rarely ever experience. Right.

So you go in there and it's, wow, what's going on? It's so quiet. But and they have all this measuring equipment in there. And so they've been chasing sound, shot sound for the last five or six years really hard. And they've gotten good. I mean, our bows are really quiet. Yeah, do they, so they have a standard arrow weight that they test that they shoot or something? Yeah, five grains.

It's kind of the industry standard. Yeah, five grains per pound. Yeah, because obviously a heavier arrow is going to be quieter. Yeah. Because I've always, do you guys ever test like, you know, there's one thing of the bow leaving. but the animals pick up the arrow. Do you guys ever test the arrow sound? Because Fletch, broadhead design, that, you know, animals hear arrows.

Right. Yeah, we haven't tested that. I'm sure Easton's done some testing or other companies with veins, but a few years ago, we were shooting Total Archie Challenge, and there's like 10 of us in our group. And there were some guys down by our target, but kind of around the rock. you know, in a safe spot, they're waiting for the shuttle to pick them up. And so our shot, it was like 110-yard shot, the grand finale of the day.

So we're all just shooting and because there was no behind us, we're kind of emptying our quivers. We're all just shooting as many as we can. So we got down there and these guys came busting out from behind that rock, went up to the target and they're like, whose arrow is this? Who's, who's is this right here? And one of the guys is like, yeah, it's my arrow. And he's like, that was by far the quietest arrow in the whole group. everybody else's were whistling and loud and we couldn't even hear that arrow and they were like

taking pictures of the veins and the setup and they wanted to you know for obvious reasons they wanted to know exactly how that one was set up so I don't remember what that arrow was today but I remember there was a difference and those guys understood how important that was after being downrange yeah hearing the arrows come I know yeah so as fast these animals can react yeah makes that's why I've, you know, everybody used to shoot the blazers, which were pretty short and tall. So it's going to really cut that air and be noisy. Yeah. Now you can get the more, so I shoot the forefletch and it's more lower profile, which I think is quieter.

That's, but you still get that control because I got four on there. But yeah, I mean, I'm always thinking about what does this thing sound like heading to the animal. Yeah. And their instincts. I mean, you know, like you said, their instinct. to duck an arrow or to know something's coming that's not right or insane. I mean, they're so much better than ours. Yeah.

You know, and I don't know if you've ever had this happen, but I was driving, you know, down the highway one day and I saw this dump truck was coming towards me. And I saw, I don't know how I saw it because I'm going 60. He's going 60, but I saw this rock come off his dump truck, hit the pavement and coming from my windshield. It happened that fast. Yeah. But I still had time to do that, you know, in that moment, like, it's not my normal instance.

Right, yeah. But there was something about all of that happening and, you know, it wasn't life-threatening, but it could have been right. So an animal lives their whole life every day like that. Yeah. Like having to react to save their life, whether they're from predators or whatever. So they're so much better at it. Yeah. It's no problem to duck an arrow at 40, 50, 60 yards.

No. We think our arrows are fast enough. It's in the right condition. They're going to duck it every time. And maybe they should get hit and it's not a lethal hit or maybe it still is a lethal hit. But they're never going to just stand there and take it. Not usually. I mean, it's nice when they do.

Yeah. But yeah, normally there's a wind blowing. Something's, you know, like a little distraction for them. Either they're, I killed a bull raking on a tree once. So that was like you can get away with a lot more there or if it's windy. But also, you know, you talk about how quick and or how perspective, wait. perceptive they hark. Yeah, yeah.

I was searching for a word. But, like, I even think of this little dog that was barking at you, he's so sensitive. But if I'm just, if I, if he's looking at me and I'm just looking at him, it's all good. But if I just go like this, like, just kind of lower down, like a little predator type move, his hair stands.

So it's like, just animals are so sensitive to even the body language. Right. Or even if you just kind of squint your eyes. So it's like, we've got to think about this when we're hunting, not just the arrow and how much they can pick it up, but also your body language and how you're acting. It's like, so there's a big, you know, we've talked about it or I've talked about it before, but I remember True was filming me in Utah's Elk hunting and this bull was coming in and I told him, I said, keep your head down. Like,

you keep your hat down and your head down. Don't be staring at this bull at 10 yards because it's over. Right. Because they will see those eyes, predator eyes, staring at it. So it's, I think we can always learn and get better as far as just, just appreciating how good they are picking things up. Absolutely. What's, I'm curious. So what's your arrow set up? I'm shooting right now. Axis 300s.

I got a, I don't remember the weight of the insert, but it's their heavier insert and then 100 grains up front. Like a 55 grain insert. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Then 100. Well, it's your broadhead. I like the Grim Reaper three blade expandable.

Yeah. Yeah. I like just making a big hole. I like four blades. So yeah, I shoot those counter fours. Okay. But yeah,

they, you know, Wayne sold me on those. He was showing me some holes on deer. He's killed. And I was just like, God, that looks pretty awesome.

Yeah. Yeah. So I've been trying those. And at first I thought, I've been such a fixed blade guy because they were, you know, expandable,

literally legal here in Oregon, until you know just a few years ago so i've always just been like a mussy troll car or whatever but uh he and then i was like well i'm only going to use him on deer or bear something smaller not on elk then i was like i hit this buck that buck up there and uh on the on the wall to the left and i hit it like shooting down 36 yards in idaho down off this cliff and i hit it a little back and high and when i it was pretty windy and i shot and i had to I was just like, oh, no, because it just didn't go right where I wanted to. And the buck ran out 80 yards and piled up.

And I was just like, that was kind of cool. I mean, didn't hit it perfect. And that was a result. So then I'm like, well, maybe I should try these on elk. But so I've been using them on, you know, I think I killed some stuff this year with an iron will just because those are good heads too. I like shooting different things. But as I said, I think I told you yesterday, I practiced.

And I posted on Instagram, but I practice with. fixed blade all the time just so I'm doing everything right as far as technically and getting that arrow out of their clean but then hunt with expandable sometimes so it's a but a fixed blade will tell you exactly how that bows oh yeah tuned yeah there's no margin of error how you shoot so I just like putting different fixed blade heads on and just if all my arrows are performing the same I know that my bow set up good yeah exactly it's a good test the hoits have have been great for that so in what What bow are you shooting? I've been shooting the Alpha X-33 this year.

Yeah. Yeah. I've shot carbon for, I mean, every year. Yeah. And this year, when we got the engineers got us a few bows for hunting season, and I grabbed that Alpha X-33, and it just shot so good. It's tough to beat. So good.

Yeah. That's such a good bow. What do you sell more of, carbon or those? It's pretty even. And then it kind of depends, too, on the year. like if aluminum comes out and it's kind of all new and carbon's kind of an update, then aluminum seems to do a little bit better. But if it's a year where like carbon's all new and aluminum's kind of an update,

then carbon will do better. So it just kind of depends. So this year probably the alpha X did better. Yeah. Because it looks so different. Yeah. Yeah. This year they're pretty even.

That new cam system. I mean, it's just it kind of was the equalizer because the carbon didn't get a big update except that cam is so smooth. So a lot of guys are upgrading that had carbon. So it's pretty even this year. Yeah. So the key is, well, yeah, I mean the big updates are tough, but big updates mean more sales because people are like,

oh, this is a lot better. I need to spend two grand on a new bow. Yeah. So that's a challenge for you guys, right? It is a challenge. Yeah. I mean, it's because like I said, it means speeds maxed out and bows are quiet.

Like to have a big update, these, today's age is tough. I mean, when I first started at Hoyt, we had big updates every year. Like, there were,

the improvements were easier to come by. But man, the bows are so good now. It's, it's getting harder. But our engineers are, they're studs

and they figure something out every year. You know, I mentioned that, I can't remember where I mentioned this. Maybe it's like during one my talks today at the lift run shoot,

but I didn't, as dumb as it sounds, I didn't know anything about draw force curve, really, until I was throwing a fit about that I wanted a 90-pound bow. And so you can make a bow 90, right? So I had 80-pound bows.

We were twisting up, doing all sorts of stupid things to make it 90 pounds. But you guys showed me, like that draw force curve, it did get to 90, but it was gone right after it got there. Whereas you guys made me the bow and it gets up to 90 and it stays there. So it's just pushing that arrow at that full velocity or power or whatever. you refer to it as but that i mean that draw force curve is everything as far as performance right so yeah i was i was i saw to pull 90 but i wasn't getting the benefit of it exactly yeah so it's no energy not as much energy being stored yeah under the curve because it arced over so quick and didn't you know have any yeah kind of that flat part on the top right so yeah and so are your just in general has

the trend of Hoyt, are they more, are they better in that regard as far as energy? It's like, do you guys improve that all the time? Or is there a goal that you like, okay, here's where we need to perform or does it get better? I don't know. I think like I said, it's so related to speed. Like if we can get more speed, we can get more energy. So now what we're concentrating on is we're kind of there with the energy and with the speed, but how do we make it feel better or easier to draw?

and so the way they've shaped the curve with this new cam, the HBX exact cam, I mean, it's, it's, if you looked at two curves next to each other, you would hardly be able to tell a difference. But the details of the shape of that curve and where there, for example, our cam, it's harder to draw right at the beginning than maybe a competitor's bow. But that's okay because you're right here. You have all your strengths. You're strong right there. If it's harder to draw back here when you already spread out, now you feel like, oh, my gosh. I can't get that over the lead off, you know. And so the way that where they're putting most of the force in the drop horse curve

or under the draw horse curve. And if my engineers heard me talking, they'd be like, dude, you're saying it all wrong. But you get the idea, right? Yeah, I do. And so then when you're back here now, you get all the energy here. And when you're back here, it's it rolls over and ice a smoothie. Like, holy smokes. Is this 70?

Yeah, it's 70. Because it just feels really good. 70 feels like 60. Yeah. What does 90 feel like? 90 feels like 90 every time. How many guys want a 90-pound bow do you hear from? Sorry.

Too many, Cam. I know, I know. Yeah, I know. And, yeah, whatever. It's all right. It's good. At least, like I said, when I was trying to sell you on that, at least they're talking about it.

At least they're talking about Hoyt, right? That's right. It's better than them not talking about Hoy. For sure, yeah. Oh, no, but it's, I don't know, I had the best time having, you know, just this journey of being involved with such a great company but having waddell on he came on the podcast here and he's such you know i just i was like he was the man at hoight for so long right

and i'd be like so jealous of god how his show kicked ass you know first it was mark walmac was doing um road trips yeah and uh that show was just like you couldn't there's no competition for it It was so good. They broke the mold. They did. Yeah. And it was just like, I don't know, I've always just been a big fan of his. So it was really fun.

And seeing like, you know, part of just how Hoyt, it seems like it's been the same people pretty much. Yeah. It's like you guys have your core, whoever, and it hardly changes. Yeah. There's been a lot of loyalty, both directions. Yeah, right. I mean, Michael's been loyal to us. You've been loyal to us.

Ralph and Vick, you've been loyal to us. Yeah. And in turn, we've been. loyal to them right and so it's been it's kind of how we've just how we've operated i mean randy olmer shooting hoyt forever you know and so um yeah it's uh you know there's a few changes here and there we picked up some new people this year for example but who did you get so cody cody robins yeah he shoots giant bucks yeah he does they got yeah yeah big world record i think he'd kill it one time yeah yeah yeah and then uh uh jeff danker has a group called buck ventures

He's got a really cool mission behind his group. He's shooting Hoyt now, and his group is White Till Addictions, who are the lone wolf guys. So they're shooting Hoyt now. Bo Martonic, you know, his podcast, East Meets West. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I do know that. Yeah, a lot of people know East Meets West,

but maybe not his name. Yeah, no, I know his name's Bo. I didn't know about the last name. But yeah, I have listened to that one. Yeah. He seems like a good kid. He does a good job. So, yeah, there's, you know, there's always some new faces

and some they either retire or leave or get tired of doing it or whatever. So there's a little bit of coming and going, but for the most part, our core has been in place for as long as I've been out Hoyt. Yeah. How, like, you know, how hard is it like, because there's personalities, people have different goals, like saying, like, if you're giving too much support to one person

and not enough to another, because I'm just saying, speaking from experience, I'm like, I want a bigger, picture in the catalog or I want to be like, you know, then you're like, I want my own bow. How hard is that like dealing with people and their expectations? It's, it can be tough. I mean, yeah, speaking of the catalog. So, I mean, today the catalog is nothing, right? But that used to be it. Back in the day. Who was the biggest and who was upper left? You know, like, who was first? And I, in the first couple of years, I didn't really get it. And Mike would be like, no, we got to move him. Like,

why? It fits perfect right here. No, he can't be there. We got to move him. And he under I understood it and I soon caught on. But yeah, I can be tough. But again, you know, my job is to spend Hoyt's money the best way possible to provide a return. And we've got 200 employees that need a paycheck every month. And I'm supposed to create the demand to sell the bows to pay the bills, right? And so at the end of the day, I just got to separate my emotion, my personal feelings

for whoever and be like, this is the right thing to do, I think, to sell more bows. Yeah. So, well, I don't know. I know one thing that's probably helped is getting Joe back shooting a Hoyt. Yeah. Because he, yeah, he's got such a big reach. And he loves that new Hoyt. I mean, he's so accurate with it.

So it's pretty cool to see it. I know. I love seeing him. I mean, he just, he just is in love with it. Yeah. He's truly passionate about shooting his bow and bow hunting. He sends me archery stuff almost, I mean, I'm going to say every day, but all the time. Yeah.

I mean, just yesterday sent me the thing about a Delta Target with the 3D thing. And then today sent me this funny archery. I mean, he's just obsessed with archery. Yeah. You know, and I'll put up something and he'll like say, hey, so what did you think of that new Spothog site? Is it that much? You know, it's just like, and then when he shoots, it's for hours.

He just loves shooting his bow. Yeah. And he, you know, that new bow is so accurate. He just talks at raves about how. how good it feels to shoot. Yeah. You know, and so it's,

it's great having him in our corner for sure. For sure. Yeah. His reach, I mean, we all know it, but his reach is beyond what our reach is. Yeah,

his reach reaches people that we can't mark it too. Yeah. There was, this was, I don't know, one or two summers ago, and I was at my backyard,

and I heard the distinct sound of an arrow being shot and hitting a target over the neighbor's fence. Yeah. And I was like, And I turned to my wife, I said, was that an arrow? And she said, it sounded like it.

And then another one. And the family that lives there, there's no, I had never dreamed that they would be shooting a bow in their backyard. Right. So I go over there and I kind of peek over the fence and it's Johnny, you know, their youngest kid. And at this point, he's probably 18, 19. And he's shooting a bow. And I'm like, Johnny, what are you doing? Yeah.

He's like, dude, I got a bow. And Johnny's like snowboarder, skater, right? Yeah, not the hunting crowd. stereotype perfect as a snowboarder skateboarder right so i'm like you got a bow he's like yeah man i'm i'm gonna go hunting this year trying to get my own meat and i'm like what made you want to do that yeah oh i was listening to jill rogan and i'm like dude right there so yeah he went down to cabellos he bought the bow that he could afford and he got a target in his backyard and you know he and that's the that's the that's the reach the power of joel rogan you know in our industry is getting new people into it so yeah and it's not even i

mean, even if he wasn't shooting, because he wasn't for a while, but just talking about archery. Yeah. That's a win. Exactly. That's a win for all of us. But the fact that he's shooting the alpha X, that helps too. Yeah. 100%.

And he, yeah, it's just, do you guys see, like, do, is there an immediate response when he put something up or he talks about it that you guys notice? No, because it's hard for us to see that. Because the dealer's order. Exactly. Yeah. Because of our sales model where we don't sell consumer direct. You know, we sell the dealers and dealers sell the consumers.

And so there's a lag there when, you know, we just don't see that immediate impact. If we were selling a product online, we could see it immediately. Right. Today, you sell spiked. What happened? Oh, Joe Rogan posted something. Yeah. And so we don't get to see that.

And as a marketer, I would love to see that. But make it easy to track. With Bose, they're complicated to set up. You know, it would be. hard, it would be a really tough distribution model to be consumer direct and have consumers have a successful or a successful positive experience, having a bow just show up to their door. Yeah. Right.

Like, oh, now what do I need? Well, you need an arrow rest. How do I put that on? Yeah. You know, and you need a site. Well, what kind of site? I don't figure it out, you know. And, well, what arrows should I get?

Well, make sure they're the right ones. If you've got a 70-pound bow, you need a 300 spine arrow. You know, don't get the wrong ones because it could, you know, So much. There's so much. And so, because I have people all the time, why don't you guys sell direct? Why don't you sell direct? Man, it's just too tough.

Like, we need the dealers to be part of that experience. You know, you saw it yet last night at Wayne Shop. I mean, those guys were getting all these new shooters today set up with the right, everything right. Yeah. And I talked about that in my class today that, you know, you can have the exact same bow, same rest, same size. If the bow's not set up right, you're not going to hit anything. You're not going to probably won't kill anything. You won't be consistent.

Yeah. So I told them today, having the bow rack set it up and spend that time with you is so valuable. And I'm so lucky to be a mile from the bow rack, right? But, you know, you take it for granted because there's people out there who don't have a great shop like that. And then that's why the people travel to the bow rack to get that help because it's they, they care. They go through the details. And it's, you can't just bust that out in a half hour. It takes a while.

Takes a little while. It takes a while. And so for them to set up 20 guys last night, just grinding. I think they had nine people and they're working. But it's such a good archery pro shop, invaluable. I mean, you can't even talk about how important it really is to the success of an archer, let alone bow hunting. Exactly.

But it's, I just love. And Wayne loves, he loves it. Yeah. He loves it. at it. He loves teaching people archery. I'm a little bummed. He took off to the shop today because he's like so good.

I mean, I'm sure you guys did a great job too, but he's just like, that's his passion. Yeah. But I think he's short on guys at the shop because we had them all out here at the lift run shoot. Right.

Yeah, he's one of the model shops in the country for sure. Do they, who sells the most bows for you? Like what, like what shop? Do you know? Yeah,

I mean, he's probably pretty good on the West Coast. Yeah, he's pretty good. We've got a shop in our hometown in Utah Wild Arrow. Oh, yeah, yeah. They do a really good job. We've got some shops, you know, kind of in the Midwest and the Pennsylvania area. I mean, a lot of hunters back there. Yeah, so I don't know who our top shop is, but we have a lot of shops that just do an amazing job for us.

Shills, you know, they're the only kind of box store, and we don't consider them a box store. consider each of their locations an independent dealer. Because they do a really good job of training their employees. And because of what we just talked about, how technical it is to set up a bow and send somebody home with their new bow and knowing that it's set up right, we're pretty particular on who gets to carry Hoyt. And Schills has proven themselves, you know, as a big retailer that they can do it. And so they're a really good account, you know, and then lots of other independent shops around the country that just crush for us. Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome.

What have you, I'm so pumped you came out for the event. What do you think of what we're doing out here to lift, run, shoot? It's awesome. These guys, I mean, they pay to come and then they pay their way to get here. And then, you know, they spend a few days. They got their butt kick this morning on a workout. Yeah. It was brutal.

I was planning to do it, but then we had some technical difficulties with our presentation. And so I had to get all that ready because they were coming through for seminars, right? And so I was just watching like, I'm really glad that we had some technical difficulties this morning because that looked really. I mean, those guys just, they crushed it. And some of them are in really good shape. You can tell, like, you know, they're made for that. And some other guys are pretty average like me. And they still just pushed through it.

And you and I were talking about it, but there was no one complaining. No one, you know, harassing each other. Everyone's just positive and uplifting and helping each other get through it. So that was really cool. And then seeing them get their bows and some of them again, some of them were experienced, some of them were brand new. But again, nobody's feeling bad about where they're at in their journey. They're just here to get better.

And we need more of that. I know. More of that, man. I love it. It's so positive and so healthy. And we had a question there at the second class and it's like they hadn't hunted. So they're getting a bow for the first time. but have hiked before.

And so asked what's the best advice you can get to somebody who wants to hunt who has a hunted? And I said, I go, well, okay, you've been in the woods at least. You've hiked. That's a big thing because if you haven't been in the woods, that's a big step. So I said the difference would be is when you've been hiking, you see a deer and you're like, oh, that's cute or that's, you know, it has a fawn, whatever. If it's a big buck, you're like, oh, man, nice. That's a big buck if you even know it's a buck.

Yeah, exactly. But I said, so right now you've just seen that and just kind of appreciate that. But once you change that, your mindset from predator to prey, then you're like, you look at that animal and then all of a sudden you're feeling the wind. And you're like, oh, the wind's on the left side of my face. So I guess I could circle around here, get the wind in my face. use that rock outcropping to pop over the top and then you're in bow range. So you just start looking at things differently.

Yeah. You know, and that's the biggest mindset shift is like instead of just being out whatever, hunters have to be so in tune with everything. And it starts with, with, yeah, how do I get close to that animal? Or what's that animal's body language or is it spooked or alert? And it's just, it's pretty exciting to be able to, you know, you don't get that question too often about,

I don't know anything. How, what do I do? And that's why this, this experience, this lift, front shoot, they're getting so much advantage.

Because, you know, how we learned probably was just good luck. Yeah, yeah. Go out, figure it out.

Right. I didn't have anybody telling me the basics about, you know, you got to think, your predator, their prey, here's,

this is it, this is how you got to think about it. I didn't have a talk, no talk, no birds and bees talk like that. It was. Yeah. So it's pretty exciting for me to have, it's mostly all new hunters.

I think only like five people raise their hand that they had, you know, bow hunted or shot a bow before. So it's pretty cool. It's, I love sharing our passion with new people. Yeah, yep. And then they're going to go home. And if they're not bohunters, then probably most of their friends aren't. Right. So now they're going to home and have an influence on them.

And hopefully this is how we grow it again, you know, and get new people into it is start with a few. new people let them influence their circle and get more in so we need to have happen yeah so i mean you say that the numbers are down but all you hear the bitching about is too many hunters i know so what's what is that is that just gatekeepers they don't want new people out there or what is it that's a good question i because i've thought about that too yeah um you know it's harder to draw tags and yeah it doesn't make sense but you know I think back when I was when I was in elementary we got the deer hunt and it was called the deer hunt yeah got the deer hunt off opening day off right yeah yeah and everybody was I don't know three out of four people if I remember I were involved in the deer hunt somehow

yeah they were hunting or their family was going or whatever and that's way different now so even just like looking at that you know it's you know there's fewer people yeah but to your point it feels like there's more. And I don't know if that's because, you know, now because there are so many resources online, you know, YouTube, whatever, oh, I need to go deeper.

I need to go in this area. And digital scouting, now there's just more people in the good spots. Yeah. I don't know. I think that's a big part because like when I, you know, where I killed that bowl,

my first decent bowl is in the Eagle Cap wilderness. And to get back there, I mean, I had to go down to REI. I had to buy like four days. different topo maps and like cut them and tape them just to get this quadrant right. And then you're like reading that map and then you get back there. You don't have, I didn't have a sat phone or anything. So I was just by myself, right?

It's intimidating. And then you got this map and you're trying to figure out the map. And then if the clouds come in, you can't see mountain tops and you're like, you got to read these contour lines. It's a lot. Now it's all on your phone. Right. You put a waypoint.

Here's my truck. I'm never lost. Exactly. And so it does give everybody more confidence. And confidence is a big part of hunting the mountains. You know, when you didn't have it, you weren't going deep because you need to get back to your truck. Yeah. And it's, I do think that the mapping systems have definitely altered like hunting deep.

Yeah. Because more guys can go back there with confidence. Right. But I agree. Yeah. And then, but I don't know. I think because they say like, you know, There's detractors.

And of course, I got haters, but there's haters on the industry, too. And they'll say that, you know, hunting numbers haven't went down. And I don't know about that. But even if it was the same amount, the population has increased so much. So our percentage of hunters in general population, which I don't know what that relates to, but it definitely relates to acceptance because you talked about if their friends don't if they don't bow hunt, their friends probably don't. And so that's just less people have it like accepting hunting as being viable or being ethical or being just palatable.

And so it's, yeah, more people, same amount of hunters are just going to have less acceptance over what we love. Right. And that's going to that's going to show up in like the ballot box. Absolutely. Everything else. Yeah. Yeah. Just ask Colorado. You know what they're going through right now.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So. Yeah. It's a scary time for that, especially in states like Colorado with that liberal governor. And yeah, I'm going to go back there and speak in August talking about, yeah, just everything that's going on back there because they're trying to, you know, the lion hunting. Yeah.

Different things. I don't think of the wolves back there, too, which everybody knows about. But yeah, it's an interesting time for hunting. But what I see is a lot of excitement and passion right here at the ball rack every day. and then with this event. So I don't want to belabor the negativity part of it. Yeah. We talked about how positive this event is.

Right. And there's a lot to celebrate for sure. 100%. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's like I said, those who are engaged are more, can be more engaged than they ever were able to in the past,

just because we can follow each other online. We can comment on each other's stuff. We can watch videos every day. We don't have to wait until the next episode comes out on TV or the next magazine comes at the next month to engage in new content. So, yeah, those of us who are still at it, man, we're more engaged than our dads

and crown posts could have ever dreamed of being. For sure. And, you know, the way it is with social media is like you almost can't post too much. People are just on there nonstop, right? So whatever you put up, the more you put up, the more people watch it. Yeah.

But it's like, it's a little frustrating because I don't know if you guys deal with this, but the algorithm thing, like, do you guys ever get suppressed where you're like, yeah, why the heck is this not getting any more traction? That's frustrating. Yep. Yeah, yeah. Is that?

Yeah, we feel it. I mean, I can't remember someone the other day was telling me I can't find Hoyt. Yeah. Like, we'll just search it. I am searching it and we weren't coming up. You got to like put the whole name in there. Right. You got to put it exactly.

Yeah. You can't just do a general search because. Well, even like if I put in like, I say, me and Joe send things back and forth all the time, all the time on DMs, right? If I put in Joe, he doesn't even come up. So it's just, I mean, he's like the only Joe I ever sent messages to. So how could that not come up? What you'd be looking for? Yeah, so I got to put in Joe Rogan. So they're even like, I don't know if it's because he's like, they think he's red pill now or I don't know what it is. I don't know. Or he's, you know, maybe it's still back from the COVID thing.

But yeah, he's, I mean, but he's so big, he still grows. Right. But for people like us who we kind of rely on that, let's get our message out. Yeah. Please don't suppress us because we've got things we want to share. It's kind of frustrating. Yeah, 100%. I mean, mine was down for like two weeks where like normally my Instagram grows about 500 a day, just roughly.

And for two weeks, it was, I was losing followers every day. I'm like, I'm putting up the same stuff I've always put up. Right. So obviously you guys are throwing. rattling something back. Yeah. It drives me crazy. Yeah.

And we have no say, no input, no recourse at all. I know. I tried even, I thought, well, maybe I'm too, they think I'm whatever. So I started following Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, like, just because. Did it work? No. But I thought, well, maybe if I pretend like I'm, you know, some liberal dip shit or no, I guess there's some normal liberals but whatever i didn't vote for joe biden so anyway maybe they thought

that i'm like okay maybe he's not like super redneck yeah yeah maybe they'll help me but no didn't didn't work no no so what's uh what's on tap what's coming up for hoit like what's our tell me what the new bow yeah yeah yeah here's the engineering details don't tell matthews No. No. Well, you guys got some big plans? Yeah, I mean, like I said earlier, our engineers, they're just, they're awesome. They are. I mean, they're so smart. I mean, I go back when, you know, talking about how our bows get quieter and they're explaining stuff to me. And I'm just like, wow, how did you think of that or figure that out or why didn't you think of that sooner? But they're just an awesome team, good guys and passionate, which is so important.

They're not just some engineers we hired, and then we explained archery to them. They were already passionate about archery and bo-hunting, and they bring that passion understanding to their job, and it makes them so good. So they're always working on stuff, and they'll be, you know, we launch a new bow every year, and there'll be a new bow, and it'll have some cool stuff, and we'll see what it is. We can count on that. Well, how is it, it's kind of a sort of related, but has it changed much since Randy, walk left to Zach? I mean, or is it the... I mean, it's definitely different.

Yeah, they both have their different leadership styles and different vision. You know, Randy, obviously, very successful leading Hoyt for 30 years. Yeah. Hoyt's a premier company in this industry. And so he did a really good job. And when he retired, you know,

everybody was kind of like... Yeah, what's going to happen? And Zach stepped in. And it was awesome. He... I remember the first day, when he's present, he brought all the executive team into the office, and he drew a big circle on the white board.

And he says, this is Hoyt right now. Everything's been thrown out. What do we want back in and what do we never want back in? And he let us have a discussion. And that's kind of his been his leadership style is, you know, we don't have to keep doing it just because we did, but we can. Yeah. Or what else we want to do?

And so it's a great approach. Yeah. Yeah. So he's been awesome, just, you know, very involved. but not by any means a micromanager. I mean, he told me the first day, he's like, you're the expert of marketing, not me. So you just keep me up to speed on what you're doing

so that I'm not blindsided or that I understand why you're doing it, but I'm going to let you do it. What's been your best idea? I mean, it's tough because I've thought about this before, like after we've had a campaign, and I'm like, whose idea was that? Like, where did that come from on the team?

Was that my idea? If it was good. it was yours. Yeah, it was good. It was mine. But I mean, that's kind of how we are as a team, right? We're just sharing ideas and somebody's idea might not be the final idea, but it might trigger this

idea. Yeah. It's a process. Yeah, so, man, I I mean, I don't know. I can't even answer that. You know, because I would hate to say, yeah, I think that was my idea and it was actually someone else's idea. It was Evans.

Yeah. Yeah. No. But it's a, hey, you're boss you could take credit yeah right now that was just kind of just messing around but like so what can i do to do better for hoyt how about that oh man um well if you'd shoot your bow a little more okay i'll try that yeah you know so every day's not enough yeah try twice a day and see if that helps i got you no you're uh like said i mean i'm a you just you're the guy you know what i mean like every day you shoot your bow. I don't know anyone else who does that. Yeah. I don't know anyone else. Right. You know, there's just a few guys tournament shooters who probably do. It's their livelihood. And this is your livelihood, but you don't have to shoot every day. It wouldn't make a difference,

but you do. Right. So every day people are seeing you shoot. So yeah, I just, I appreciate that. Like, it's easy. It's easy to have you on staff. Yeah. You know, you live it. I want to make it easy. real so i want to make it like it when you guys are making decisions on your budget i want this this part to be like no-brainer that's my that's my goal with everybody but you know it has changed because i wasn't ever really on tv i mean i was on i hosted eastman's for a while on the rocky mountain out now but i was never a waddell yeah so it's it's uh i was just kind of the grinded-out guy and now the fact that social media and i just kind of went in social media kind of hard early Yeah.

And now it's like social media is pretty much not everything, but a lot of, a lot of everything. And it's so yeah, it feels pretty good to to have grinded later. And now it's like, oh, this is, we're reaching a lot of people now. Yeah. Because when I'm not suppressed, I'm getting, you know, it'll get to, I don't know, I've been to 40 million people in a month. So you think like on your insights or your reach or whatever, but 40 million, like,

Like you think about the TV days or the magazine days, you know, if you're reaching a hundred thousand, that's pretty good. Right. You know, I mean in a magazine, but maybe more if it's multiple times on the outdoor channel. But I mean, we're blowing that out of the water as far as getting the archery lifestyle out there. Yeah. And that's, that's pretty sweet.

Yeah. Social media's helped us there. Yep. Yeah. But it's been it's been a good run. I mean, I'm like, I'm super thankful to be such a great. a long time staff member of Hoyt

and like you guys have supported me so much I got my name on a bow I mean it's and hopefully it's selling does it sell? It sells. Yeah, it sells.

What? Well, probably is because it's not out east it probably doesn't outsell bone collector, do you think? Um, I don't know. We don't talk about our numbers,

but both bows do both bows do well. They exactly, they, exactly the same. same exactly the same sales right that's right split right split even well hopefully it's paying off but i i mean i appreciate because bow hunting has been everything to me and to have a partner like you guys and you know for you to believe in me and say those nice things and to be here for this this epic event

that i've dreamed dreamt about for years it means a lot yeah i mean i remember when we remember we did the i'm defiant video yeah and the like i don't remember it was a friday and a saturday and on Friday, you're like, should we do a lift run shoot tomorrow? And I was like, how are we going to do that? He's like, I'll just put out a thing on social media and see if guys show up. So on Friday, you text, who wants to lift run shoot tomorrow morning, Piscay, 8 o'clock? Yeah. And like 20 guys showed up. Yeah. And they ran the hill with you. Then we went to the farm and lifted weights and then we shot bows. Yeah. And was like, that was. And you had done a couple before that. Right. Yeah. But that was the first lift run shoot that I was part of. And it was so

just for the moment. It was. I remember the trail we were running on when I, when I said that. And it was like on the bottom along the river. Yeah. We had been, and we just talked about it right there. And I'm like, oh,

I just put it out right now. And yeah, it's, so it's always been, I've always loved sharing this. And now it's just at an, at another level. But yeah,

you were, you were definitely there for that one. Yeah. And that video did pretty good. I mean, yeah, that video was cool. I can't remember who,

who edited that one. That was Taylor. Taylor, yeah. Such a good job. Yep. Yeah. Yeah,

it was a fun campaign. Yeah, it was a fun campaign, except the numbers are out there so then people if they didn't get the views they thought they should they're probably upset whatever you know and or like why'd they do a film on this person they should have done on this person i'm sure you guys had to deal with all that but that's that's your job yeah but uh no thank you jeremy i mean it's uh you know this relationship means a lot to me and i'm I'm so appreciative and grateful.

Yeah. So thank you. Thank you. Well, thanks for taking time out. We've got to get back out to our event out there. But thank you for jumping on the podcast. Thanks for having me. All right.

Keep hammering. All right.