Here is a quick rundown of what Wired2fish C.O.O. Jason Sealock thinks today's announcement about the Bass Pro Group purchasing Fish Holdings, LLC means to boat buyers, anglers, the industry and the companies involved.
Reactions to the Bass Pro Group Acquisition of the Fish Holdings LLC
Bass Pro just made a big move to corner the market on the fishing boat industry. With today’s announcement of Bass Pro Group purchasing Fish Holdings, LLC from Platinum Equity (see the full release below), the Bass Pro Group now has a solid line up of both aluminum and fiberglass fishing boats in their stables.
Since the announcement was posted, our phones have been ringing off the hook asking what this means for the future of the Ranger, Triton and Stratos boat brands. What does it mean for the pro anglers sponsored by those boat brands, and most importantly the consumers of those boat brands?
While I don’t have my crystal ball handy, I think this could be good for all parties, given that certain things stay the same and certain things change.
What does it mean for the future of the three boat brands purchased? All three of the purchased boat brands build quality boats. They’ve invested a lot of money, technology and time into their processes and their people, and their state-of-the-art facilities aren’t going anywhere which likely means their people aren’t going anywhere. That’s good for the consumers in that for the most part, the people you’ve worked with will likely still be the people you will work with in the future.
If anything when you see brands merge like this, the first questions are hopefully related to synergies or borrowing of technology and processes to make all boats better. That again is good for all consumers.
I think what you have now is a lot of tiers and a lot of options for fishing boats out on the market. The early word is that Ranger, Triton and Stratos will maintain their boat building autonomy which is what needs to happen for all brands to continue to be successful. But now they will all be able to leverage each others experiences with those of the Bass Pro Group.
Read More:
http://wired2fish.scout.com/story/1491084-what-does-the-bass-pro-acquisition-mean