Wednesday, March 25, 2009

The economic downward trend claims its first hunting industry victims

© By Othmar Vohringer

The world wide economic decline has claimed many victims. Businesses went belly up and the multinational industry begs the governments for huge bailout sums, and unemployment figures are at an all time high.

It was only a matter of time until we would hear rumors and news of hunting industry bankrupts. Rumor has it that Horton Crossbows is in financial trouble and as of this writing is negotiating a takeover by a multinational company to save the company. Should the deal fall through Horton will have to close the doors.

Another hunting industry giant, the Sportsman’s Warehouse, had been in the rumor mill about financial difficulties for quite some time. The rumor has now become fact with the company filing for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection. The good news is that despite the financial problems some Sportsman’s warehouse stores are still open for the time being with no closures scheduled. The bad news is that 22 locations in 17 states have been closed, leaving 1’700 employees without a job.

Read the full story here.

So far the hunting industry has done remarkably well compared to other industries. Especially firearm and ammunition factories. I hope that the global economists and politicians get the economy back on track before it claims too many more victims.

Othmar Vohringer Outdoors
Founding Member of Outdoor Bloggers Summit

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

It is truly disheartening to see what is happening to our economy. Unfortuately I don't see it getting better anytime soon.

gary said...

Sportsmans Warehouse had a store in Boise Id.(65 mi.away)for several years and for some reason built a second store in Nampa, Id. (45 mi. away)a couple years ago. The Nampa store is closed as of last week and the Boise store stays open. Seems like some poor decision making on building the second one.

Anonymous said...

I have been following the Sportsman's Warehouse saga over on my blog also. One of the things I have most often heard is "Too Big, Too Fast". So it goes in a number of companies these days. Truly, too bad!

deerslayer said...

Othmar; Youve opened the doors to a large variety of discussions and conclusions with this post.It's only my opinion but I'm really surprised that there aren't more stores downsizing their merchandise selection and closing some of their stores across the nation to save money. Although I think that guns will become the big seller in many stores now as people try to protect what is theirs as the economy gets worst and it will get worst before it gets better.Survival equipment will be the second best seller.Here in Tennessee I've seen alot of hunting stores come and go and some I don't even know how they stay in business but the bottom line is only the financially stable companies will survive the economic pressures of todays economy.

SimplyOutdoors said...

It is too bad that these particular companies are suffering, but in these economic times it doesn't surprise me. I hope both companies that manage to keep a float...someway, somehow!

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