Made in the USA!

[smashdn]

I was in Academy last night looking for a rod to replace one that my father in law broke the tip on. After reading on here about how some of you have had bad experiences using certain brands of rods either due to quality, or customer service, or warranty issues I was really searching for a rod made right here in America. Come to find out that Academy only carried one brand of rod that is made in the USA.

I thought that there might be some like minded people who would appreciate a listing of fishing products that are made here in America.

I start the list off with what I saw to be true last night.

RODS
Falcon Rods


If you could please post up national companies (because I am sure there are a lot of people that are local to you that make soft plastics or other baits but are not available outside your immediate area) whose products are still made and manufactured here in the USA.

[stonyloam]

St Croix Rods. Park Falls WI, St. Croix Fishing Rods - Spinning, Casting, Saltwater, Fly

Grear customer service, great warranty LOVE em!

[GRIZZ]

St Croix Triumph series are made in China. All the rest are still made here, though those new Mojo rods say made in North America. Not sure if that includes Canada.

[Big George]

I live In Broken Arrow Oklahoma home of Falcon Rods I can tell you this they are a class act I have had trouble with a couple rods and they took care of it right away If you are wanting a really good rod for crappie fishing and have to have one that is USA made you might try the Nestor Falls rod from falcon it is a medium light 7'0 and seems to be the ticket I however am pretty sure that as with all falcon obtains the componets to make the rods from Japan or China

[smashdn]

In my continued search for a new crappie road I went to Gander Mtn. last night. The had more of a selection of American made roads but they were all casting except for a very limited few and most of those were medium to med/hvy.

So here is what I found out. Kistler, St. Croix, G Loomis, and some of the upper end H & H rods are made in America.

Are any reels still made here? I saw a bass fishing style baitcaster in a case listed for 449.99. I thought that that was crazy.

[skiptomylu]

Falcon Rods are very good products!

St Croix have one and love it as it is a 7' that works perfect on crappie. Also have one high end GLoomis that I really like, but it's a bass rod.

One other thing is these companies have a great warranty too.

Skip

[The Lip RIPPERS]

All good companies for sure, I can add to the St. Croix they offer blanks to the custom builders as well. We have tried to take our line of rods national, get this; to do buisiness with Academy you are required to have; A 1 million dollar product liability insurance policy, bar coding system, and ordering software, total cost before stocking your products $2200.00 !!! We are meeting with another American based company on March 14th. to discuss adding a line of made in USA crappie rods to their popular soft baits....We hope this can be arranged for far less, now thats some major overhead!

[crappie cowboy]

Well so far it looks like as if we only have the ole cane pole to fish with if we're gonna boycott China.
I was fed up with the PRICES of the poles that are selling now, and got to reading up on cane poles, and found out that B&M use to ship cane to China for them to make poles.
I don't know if they are still doing that, but somebody is supplying the bait shops, I see them all the time.

crappie cowboy

[Scott S]

All good companies for sure, I can add to the St. Croix they offer blanks to the custom builders as well. We have tried to take our line of rods national, get this; to do buisiness with Academy you are required to have; A 1 million dollar product liability insurance policy, bar coding system, and ordering software, total cost before stocking your products $2200.00 !!! We are meeting with another American based company on March 14th. to discuss adding a line of made in USA crappie rods to their popular soft baits....We hope this can be arranged for far less, now thats some major overhead!

Hey! Hope this March 14th meeting is at or near the Lake Eufaula Marina or else there's gonna be a lot of folks disappointed to not get to see you.
Scott

[Scott S]

St Croix Triumph series are made in China. All the rest are still made here, though those new Mojo rods say made in North America. Not sure if that includes Canada.

Or Mexico. I'm guilty of buying made in the USA even when sometimes it's not the best economic choice for my family but anyway here's a story about Mexican vs American.
I work for an appliance manufacturer where we use about 55,000 pounds of galvanized sheet steel per day. We apply a powder coat paint at our plant. Our steel was coming from Mexico until they stopped exporting due to their own growth and demand for it. We then began paying a higher price and buying domestic steel. The finish (technically called spangle I believe) of the US steel is so poor compared to the Mexican product that we struggled for weeks attempting to adjust our paint process so we had an acceptable finished product. In the end we did not match the finish quality of before but close enough to make it acceptable.
Personally, I will pay more for made in the USA because I know that I live better than the employee in Mexico or Asia etc. does however it's really discouraging when the US products (especially commodities like steel) are not of equal quality to the other countries'.
Scott