October 2010

According to which business consultant you ask, anywhere from seven to nine out of every ten new businesses will fail within their first 3 years. And, among those that fail, the owners rarely understand why they failed. In nearly every single case, one of two mistakes, or a combination of both, led to the downfall.…

In February of 1999 I published a Russ Gooding article outlining his technique for inlaying feathers on fishing rods. Russ didn’t take credit as the originator of the idea – neither he nor I had any idea who was the first person to do such a thing. Within a month of the article’s publication, I…

It’s often been said that word of mouth is the best advertising there is. There’s certainly some truth to that. In years past, however, word of mouth was slow to travel but the advent of the internet has changed all that. Good talk, and just as importantly, bad talk, now spreads as quick as lightning.…

When I was actively engaged in building and selling custom rods, I made it a point to always pad my delivery times by a week or two. If I knew I could get a rod done for a customer in four weeks, I’d tell him that it would take at least five. This accomplished a…

These days, magazine editors are constantly faced with changing technology. The trick is to know when something is a fad and can be dispensed with, and when something is here to stay and needs to be implemented. I first met Ian Scott of Pairowoodies.com back in 1999. About a year later, after much effort on…

RodMaker has been proud to lead the way in introducing the vast majority of the newest and most important rod building techniques and methods of the past 15 years. But we’ve been equally busy during that same time period documenting important rod building history of the past. Part of that endeavor has included a series…

Since the mid to late 1970’s, 2-part epoxies have been the standard thread finishing medium for nearly all commercial rod companies and most custom rod builders. But that may be about to change. If you follow this blog you know that earlier this year I was sent a sample of a new epoxy that I…

About this time last year I was in the early stages of preparing an article on how to identify the causes of rod breakage by examining the broken rod sections. Every break leaves behind telltale clues – you just have to know what to look for and understand what you’re seeing. In order to provide…

Collectively, the custom rod building craft has always had an impact upon commercial rod manufacturing. They watch the custom building craft for new methods, techniques, trends and ideas. Almost every single commercial rod building operation in North America subscribes to RodMaker Magazine. The reason should be obvious. Individually, however, few custom builders can claim to…

RodMaker is filled with articles submitted by authors with varying degrees of writing skill.  Nothing gets turned down due to bad writing, of course. The quality of the information being conveyed is the important thing and most any submission can be cleaned up and presented properly.  There are, however, several authors that continually impressed me…