Path to Professional Angling

Brian Bashore (00:00) Hey folks, thanks for tuning into this episode of real talk fishing podcasts with no limits this week. We're going to dive in deep to the things that make pros and how you can evolve from the weekend angler or the sales guy at the sporting goods store, whatever your aspirations may be, if you're looking to take it to the next level, if you're looking to move into that professional angler title into that, into the industry, the Marine industry, the boat. sales, marketing, whatever aspect of it is it. And we're going to do all that and get some insight information on how these pros become pros and the steps they need to take and the tools that are out there to make them better at it from Mr. Pat and I himself, the president, the director, whatever you want to call them of the national professional anglers association. Now, Pat's got a very extensive background in, in sales and marketing and, and most importantly. As a tournament angler, Pat has, you know, has got great accolades on the, on the tournament side, he's been doing it for years in the walleye world. So understands that and where they're coming from and what it is the anglers need as well as the industry needs. So, you know, if you're ever wanting to take that next step or just wondering what it is that kind of, how do these guys make it live? And what is it they're doing? How do they get to this point? Pat is going to give us some tips to tell you about that. And some of these answers might surprise you. So. Pat is a freshwater fishing hall of fame member. So this guy is no stranger. He's been around and knows what he's talking about. We're going to dive in deep. Here's some stuff from Pat. So, so stay tuned to learn the inside scoop from Pat and I on what it takes to become a professional angler in today's world. So stay tuned real talk fishing podcasts with no limits. Here we go. Hey folks, thanks for tuning into another episode of real talk, fish and podcasts with no limits. This time we're going to dive in a little deep to what makes a pro a pro. There's nobody better to answer this question as well as all the hard questions other than the president of the national professional anglers association, Mr. Pat Nye. So let's just wet a line. Let's dive in and let's get some inside scoop. from Pat. So morning, Pat. How are we doing? Pat (00:35) Hey Brian, I'm doing great. Brian Bashore (00:38) Been a busy month. You're in Florida, I assume, staying super warm. Way better than up here in South Dakota, but I got a lot of snow melting right now. So. Pat (00:48) Well, I miss winter at times, but not for very long. So yes, I am in Florida. Brian Bashore (00:56) It's not hard to miss the last few weeks with the negative 20 30 below zero, but we made some good ice That's that's about the only positive about it But it doesn't look like it's gonna stick around long because we got 40s and other places or even in the 50s or the next Couple weeks, so I'm okay with that, too Yeah, yeah, we'll take it. So you just finished up your annual conference in January down there in Florida Before we get into that I know you Pat (01:03) That's good. Unbelievable. Brian Bashore (01:22) A lot of the pro anglers in the walleye world and just people in the industry know Pat, Pat's been around a long time. That's a freshwater fish and hall of fame member. Uh, what four or five years ago was inducted, I believe. When 18, five time flies. Um, but the listeners may not know who Pat is. So let's just tell them a little bit about Pat. What's your background? Um, where you come from and how do you end up here? Pat (01:33) 2018 five years ago almost six now. Yep It does Sure. Well, I mean, the reason I ended up here is because I have a passion for fishing. It started when I was three years old. About the time I could start to walk, I started to fish. And, you know, it's been my life ever since. My entire career has been the outdoor industry. Since I was 15, I started in retail sporting goods and worked my way through the industry. Was a manufacturer's representative and a rep principal. in the 90s and early 2000s for North Country Marketing and company that I helped establish. And, you know, we represented firearms, Browning Firearms, Winchester Ammo. And I did that for a reason. It allowed me to fish. Hey folks, we're back. A little technical difficulty there. We got to get Pat switched around. Who knows why. When you got full service, cyberspace world just has plans of its own. So we're back with Pat and I, the president of the National Professional Angler Association, and Pat is just telling us about his background. I think we left off it in the in the sales industry of part of the industry. Pat Neu (00:07) No, no. That's correct. So, you know, passion for the sport led to me becoming involved in the sport. And, and I, I love every aspect of the outdoor industry. I love the people. I love the industry itself. Um, so it, you know, the, the passion for the sport led me to the sales side. And then, you know, it got to be really difficult for me to raise a family. Um, about 2005, exactly 2005, I went to my partners and said, you know, I got two boys, nine and 12, I need to see them grow up. I think I'm gonna change paths here. So I left a very good career as a sales representative and started fishing full time in 2005. I had been fishing the FLW, did real well with that. And in 2006, started fishing both the FLW tour, walleye tour and the PWT. And did that for as long as the PWT was around. So there was one year, I kind of laugh at the bass guys who think the walleye guys don't fish. In 2000... would have been 2007 with the PWT Super Pro and the PWT Tour and the FLW Tour and the other tournaments. I fished 13 tournaments in four months that year. That's a lot of tournaments, a lot of tournaments. And back in, would have been 2005 or so I was... Brian Bashore (02:05) That is a lot. Pat Neu (02:14) Back when the walleye ratings were there, power ratings were there. I was second for a while. Um, I didn't quite beat Mr. I think Mr. Parsons was in number one. So I've been around. I love tournament Um, I love the fact that people can make a living in this industry any way they choose to do so. Um, and it's, it's going to be a matter of how creative you are from that point forward, just to how you, you mean what, what you want to do. You're a good example, Brian. Um, you know, you've tried a lot of different things. You've, you've worked in this industry as a guide, a tournament Angler. You've had sponsorships. There's opportunity out there. Just, you have to look at this as a business. And that's what we do with NPAA is teach people how to take that passion, work it to become a profession, whether full or part-time. Brian Bashore (03:08) Yeah. So it is clearly has changed over the years and evolved what kind of differences you see from, you know, 2005 and you took the leap leaving a great job. It's like all of us were away from home a Um, 13 tournaments, you know, if a guys are fishing a couple circuits or locals isn't, it's a ton, it's a ton of time away from home on the national level. Now we just have the four and the championship. Um, but most guys are probably fishing that six to eight tournaments, maybe a year, but 13 is. Pat Neu (03:31) Mm-hmm. Brian Bashore (03:36) That's a lot of time away from home, but what do you see has evolved kind of from 05 five to here we are going into a 24 season on the, on the pro angler side. Pat Neu (03:47) It's definitely changed. And, you know, I look back and look at Parsons and Kavais for a great example. They left lucrative careers in the early nineties to go full time at a time when there really wasn't that much opportunity on the water, but they took this next step and they saw the opportunity to help promote the sport and to grow the sport through sales as as opinion leaders slash pro staff that did a tremendous job and made a, you know, made a really good living over the years doing that, but they ran it as a business and today it's changed. No, I don't think you, you can't take their path today and be successful because their path doesn't exist. And it's changed because of technology. Brian Bashore (04:41) Right? Yeah. Pat Neu (04:46) Um, it's changed because of the economy. Um, you know, it's, it's difficult to justify going out there and fishing a, a circuit in make a living without a lot of sponsorship, um, which is difficult to get, if not impossible in the world we live in, um, and, you know, to, to offset expenses and then live on winnings. It's just, there's so many good anglers out there today. Um, and. Brian Bashore (05:04) Yeah. Yeah, I think it's fair to say you're not going to make a... If you're fishing tournaments to make a living in the walleye world anyway, it's not it's not going to happen. It's not feasible. Pat Neu (05:23) I don't think it's going to happen on the bass world. And Jacob Fouts is a good example. I mean, that, that went viral. Jacob said a few things about the bass world. He made the elite, you know, college angler went to the opens. Went one year, made it to the elite series, fished the elite series two years. And he came out and said, he's not making it work. You know, it's, he's struggling. Um, then he's a great angler. You can't. make a living on your winnings alone as a tournament angler. Now, if you want to go out there and you've got the bug, you've got this passion and this excitement, you can add business to the fishing. In other words, you try to offset expenses to the degree you can with sponsorships and making good business decisions and treating it as a business, but it's still going to be very difficult. No one's just going to come and start throwing you money. because you can catch fish. Because quite frankly, nobody gets paid to fish and they never have been, you know. Kevin Van Damme didn't get paid to fish. Kevin Van Damme got paid because he could sell product. Because what he knew about angling and what he shared about angling created opportunity for the industry, which helped the industry and the sport. I mean, he gave more back than he took. Brian Bashore (06:22) No, nobody gets paid to fish. No. Pat Neu (06:50) in. Brian Bashore (06:50) Now being a good angler and winning like KVD or a Wheeler or in our world, a Hoyer or Dewey's been on a roll and Sprengel obviously elevates that platform for the exposure to create those other opportunities. So it's certainly a piece of the puzzle and part of it, but it is not the means to all whatsoever because we both know you can, you can be on top one year and on the bottom, the next. Pat Neu (06:55) Right. There's more about. Absolutely. N-n- Correct. Today it's even more important to understand the balance between catching them, which gives you credibility, and then taking that credibility and that exposure that winning or doing well does for you and adding value for sponsors that you may work with. And when I say adding value, it comes down to one thing, Brian, you have to increase sales for them, all that matters is sales, because that's what creates all the revenue to allow someone to pay you for helping them increase sales. You're adding value and it's the way the world works. Brian Bashore (08:10) I think I know a guy who says nothing happens until a sale is made. I think it's something like that, right? Pat Neu (08:16) That's nothing happens until something sold. It's that simple. It's. Brian Bashore (08:19) until something sold. That's true. And you, you know, and we'll dive into this pro staff versus sponsorship stuff that kind of drives me nuts, but let's get to, before we get into that, let's let people know about the NPAA, what it is, where it came from. And then I think that'll lead us into these, the sponsorship type stuff and how the NPA helps with. Pat Neu (08:42) Sure. So the NPAA was formed in 1996. Excuse me. Um, group of anglers got together, uh, back then and said, you know, we need to work together to help raise awareness about what we do as professional anglers and help each other become better at what we do. So it's a trade association and it was formed in South Dakota happens to be where you're sitting, um, by a group of anglers, um, Mike McClellan was the president back at that time. Did a great job forming the organization. A bunch of anglers that are still members helped form it. Parsons and Cavias and Glorvigans and Tommy Skarlis And the organization had this desire to help those that wanted to make a living fishing. And at that time it was mostly tournament anglers, the guides, the whole guides, um, component hadn't come into it at that point, even though McClellan was a guide as well as a tournament angler. Um, so it moved forward. It, it, you know, they had a good platform to start. They brought in partners and not a lot of them, but they had Mercury back then. They had Evan Rude, they had Ranger boats, they had, um, Lund boats. Those are the ones that come to mind. And then Bruce DeShano at Offshore Tackle, been there from the beginning. But they did a great job and they grew and grew, I think they got up to probably have been the late 90s to about 500 members or so. And then it started to taper backwards. I mean, the, I guess those that... Brian Bashore (10:18) your tech. Pat Neu (10:44) that had joined, thought there might be more to it than what there was, and it just kind of went backwards. So I got involved in 2005, really, the first conference I ever went to, I joined the organization. And by 2008, I became president of the organization. And I've been involved ever since. So, you know, in... When I came on board, it became very apparent that we needed more structure. We needed, um, you know, really a simplified mission statement. And it's, it's been my desire to see us grow to what we should be, which to me is an organization, an umbrella organization of tournament anglers, guides, charter captains, angler educators. Um, Anybody that's making a living or would like to make a living fishing, which would include the trade, you know, so we've got partners and that grew dramatically when I got involved. So, you know, we've got brand wise, you probably have 80 brands under our umbrella as partners. We've got we've got nonprofit partners and so forth. But on the members side. You know, we started to grow pretty quickly and we're up about 1400 members and we're teetering back and forth at about 1400 members. What's frustrating to me is that there are, to the best of my ability in, in coming up with metrics, because the metrics don't exist as to how many guides, captains, tournament anglers, and angler educators are out there, which to me are, that's the most important metric the industry. should be working from. Because these are the people that understand the sport better than anybody else. They're actively involved every single day, whether full or part time. And they're the number one customers. I mean, I don't care if you're sponsored or not, you still buy a lot of product. And a lot. So doing some math and talking to some industry people, upper level industry people, I think there's about 150,000 of those out there. Brian Bashore (12:49) A lot. Pat Neu (13:02) If you take the whole country, East coast to West coast, that you know, the Gulf coast, all of all everybody in between, including the guides that wait in the streams out West. And you know, it's just, there's a lot. And the reason I say 150,000, there's 50, let's say I'm in rounded, there's actually 54 million according to the most recent number, but there's 50 million anglers in this country. 150,000, three tenths of 1%. So I'm talking, we're just a small number, but it's a big number. So the influencers are a small number, but it's a big number. And I'm trying to get them under one umbrella. And the hard part is getting them to understand what we're talking about here. Because if I got them, every single one of them that are out there to watch this podcast and all the other ones that I do, Brian Bashore (13:48) Yeah. Pat Neu (14:00) and listen to what I'm saying. And all we're trying to do is bring the opinion leaders under one umbrella to allow us to become a force and a factor for the future of the sport fishing because we care more than everybody else, because we're trying to make a living at it and we've got more passion than everybody else. And what we do is far bigger than getting a discount on some product from our 80 some brands that we have. Um, as partners, that's really good because it helps them create sales. So they think we're pretty cool. They think that that's a good investment because we bring them incremental sales. And again, it's all about sales. But to me, the important part of the NPAA, it really should be for everybody is it brings us under an umbrella and gives us a voice in things that matter access to, to the resource. Brian Bashore (14:39) Oh yeah. Pat Neu (15:00) Helping to manage the resource as people who understand it better than the resource managers do because we're on the water all the time Ability to watch for legislation that could affect our ability to do business You know things like in Brian, I think you were aware of this If you've got a wrapped truck and boat and you're going down the highway Brian Bashore (15:24) Oh, yep. Pat Neu (15:25) You could get pulled over at any way station in this country because you need a DOT number because you're in pursuit of revenue when you're driving to a tournament. That's why you're getting paid by somebody to wrap that boat in a truck. They can pull you over and if you don't have a DOT number, you get a fine. They could take your truck and it's not happening, but these are the things that I'm watching that could happen overnight. Brian Bashore (15:52) Yeah, that was a big hot issue in Minnesota, what, four or five years ago. Pat Neu (15:54) It was, that's correct. It was really hot. There was a, in Iowa for a while, there was a couple, uh, DOT stations there, but that's just one example. I mean, there's so many others out there, you know, in, in Michigan right now, we're, we're working with our, our group of, in our network, ASA, congressional sportsman's foundation, um, the BASS and the Michigan conservation, uh, I guess, Conservation Commission, coalition there, to try to circumvent a law that they're proposing that's gonna allow commercial fishermen to take game fish again. That hasn't happened since the turn of the century. Now there's this talk about that, you know, allowing, you know, having them be able to go out and throw nets and take perch and take walleyes and take northerns. Brian Bashore (16:28) coalition. Pat Neu (16:56) Those are the things that we are doing as part of a coalition that's out there to help our members and to help the future of the sport. And to me that's the most important part of what we do. Brian Bashore (17:09) Right. It's the whole rising tide moves all ships type thing. I want to get those 50,000 of all those outfitters guides. There's, there's a lot of them out there. And I know it's been a big hot topic in South Dakota lately on some of the fishing forum pages that, you know, everybody has an open weekend and, uh, an ice shack, they're a fishing guide and these places are getting bombarded. Now we don't have very minimal regulations here, unlike some other states to become the fishing guide. Um, it's kind of like. When it was a contractor in Nebraska, he had a cell phone on a pickup and a tape measure. There you go. You're a contractor. Um, some of those are changing and I would personally like to see some further restrictions to, to minimize that some, but that's a lot of people, a lot of voices. Um, we've had some, some wins recently, North Dakota. I know we kind of led a little bit of effort on that. The North Dakota guys, Axman and, uh, there you go. Jeremy and Johnny candle. Pat Neu (17:41) We're in. Jeremy Olson. Jeremy wrote that legislation. Brian Bashore (18:05) Yep. And, and candle on those guys really, but we, you know, kind of spearheaded or jump started that and got, uh, Chris Horton from congressional sports, this foundation involved. For those of you that don't know North Dakota had a, an old rule, kind of a typical move by a game commissions and this policy in general things happen. And in a general public just doesn't pay attention to a lot of these things. They don't read the minutes. So you don't, you're unaware. And then they have things titled or named different than what you would be aware of. Pat Neu (18:11) We did. We're gonna wait now. Yep. Brian Bashore (18:33) Um, so shame on the public for not noticing, but it's completely common. Not many people follow that stuff close until it's too late. And in this case, it was too late. So it took legislative action to go back through. Um, they wanted to raise the permit fee for tournaments to basically, um, I think it was 10% of the total. Pat Neu (18:51) 10% of the total revenues, which really the total revenues are the tournament entry. So if it's a $500,000 purse, it would have been $50,000 fee. Brian Bashore (18:53) Right. Yeah. And these are paid directly out of the tournament organizations pocket. So you're losing. So immediately they, they lost all the big national wildlife tour. I think hand to hand was going to go there. Aim, aim worked out something. MWC just said, we're done. We can't afford to go to your state. Tourism is great, especially Susie at devil's lake over there. She had a lot to work on that, but they helped subsidize some of that and help get these tournaments there because it's huge for the economy, but bam, just like that, no one's going to North Dakota. Pat Neu (19:18) MWC didn't go. Brian Bashore (19:34) tournament fishing anyway, anymore. So you lose all that license revenue, all that, you know, that local economic drive with those small towns, which is just astronomical. I think that was like, did the study and brought in $400,000 in seven days. You know, that's, I mean, he figured you got 50 gallon fuel tank on your boat and you're almost filling it up every day. Plus fishermen are going to buy everything you got, snacks, drinks, hotel, lodging. You got to eat a little bit, but they're going to buy every lure you got. You know, every tackle chop sells out of the hot thing. Uh, it's, it's a lot of money, but they got that rewritten and actually, I think it's down to $250 for permit now. So not only did they. Pat Neu (20:12) That's which is, which is similar to every other state, but here's the big issue that a lot of people don't even know this. So we were made aware of this change in the way they were going to enforce old legislation because they had been kind of circumventing what the old legislation said, and they actually had implemented a $5,000 per event fee and it had to go to a conservation fund. And it directly, so they wrote a $5,000 check to the conservation fund. Um, and the tournament organizations were doing that. Well, then they decided that, no, they've got to enforce what's on the, on the books. So we were made aware of this from a. NPA a member in North Dakota. We started to get involved. We got all those others that you mentioned CSF and BSS and, and ASA American sport fishing association, because I'm on. their government affairs committee and have been for going on 10 years now. So I watched this stuff closely. Everybody got involved. So it's this whole coalition and it all started because an NPA member contacted us to make us aware of it. Otherwise, as you said, it would have probably gone through with, with nobody understanding that the change had been made until that year came, you know, when NWT or MWC went to go to the state and they found out that their fees, 10% of the, of the tournament revenues. So we got, yes it went into effect for a while, but we got the ball rolling and then as Brian you and I talked about when it was coming down because you were president back then of the NPAA, when it started and we started to get involved we tried to get the ahead of the curve here, you know, and not have to go through the legislative standpoint. We had to go through the legislative part of this. So an NPA member, Jeremy Olson got involved because he was running nonprofit tournaments, which this law affected them too. So that meant that the nonprofits had to give 10% of their take back to the state. And the long and short of it is this. This is exactly the type of situation that I talk about when I talk about the need for an umbrella organization to watch this and then to fight it. Because the more people that are out there, especially influencers, which that's what our members are, our influencers, the more of them that can help tell the story and get others activated, the better off we all are. Whether we're professional anglers or we're general public. you know, who are out there wanting to go fish. So that's the real advantage that we can bring is we can help activate all this. We can't, today we can't do it ourselves. We get 50,000 is as members. Think of the money that we'd have in our coffers. We'd be able to hire, because we're a nonprofit, we're a 501C6, we're a trade association. So nobody's gonna get rich here. The money's going to be funneled back into what our mission is, which is to grow and is to increase the professionalism of our members as we work to grow and protect the sport. The grow and protect the sport part is to me the most important part. The increased professionalism, we're working at that with our conference and, you know, the networking and so forth. And we've got more coming if we get more revenue on educational, you know, initiatives and so forth. But Brian Bashore (23:29) Right. Pat Neu (23:58) If we have 50,000 members and $100 a year, do the math, all of a sudden we've got a lot of money in our coffers, about $5 million just from that, that we can use to protect what we all love to do. And that's what we'll do with it. Brian Bashore (24:19) It's simple, but yet not so simple. Obviously the more money, the more you can do. I think people, you know, when attrition, you lose members, you gain members. Some expect this, respect that. But first off, the members need to be engaged and pay attention and read emails and come to conferences when they can and make things happen. But not everybody's going to be in that. And that's fine. Doesn't mean they're not getting the information and they can speak to an issue or a topic or. Pat Neu (24:23) That's right. Word. Brian Bashore (24:47) or a new made or something that comes out because they see it through the NPAA, but protecting the sport, it all ties together protecting the sport as a, as a guide myself and all guides should and foremost be the ones that care about it more than anything. If you don't have that resource to use the waters, the land where you're a hunting outfitter, a fishing outfitter, you don't have it, you don't have a job. You don't have a career. And if you don't have that resource. You don't have the sponsorship because there's no tackle company selling anything to nobody that can go use it. It's, it's real, it seems so simple, but I don't think everybody grabs the big picture of it sometimes. It realizes that you just, you lose one little piece of whatever it is. Access is a huge one. Everything snowballs and you lose a big piece of something else. Pat Neu (25:21) It's been so simple. Correct. correct. So, you know, as we go through the years here and we look at the, where the NPAA came from and where we are now and what we see for from a strategic standpoint for a vision for the future, we've got so much opportunity ahead of us. It's unbelievable. And it's not, you know, it's part of it's to protect the sport, which that's great. That's what, as you just said, that's what matters. Because the access and the fishery, you know, I'm going to give you a good example of that. We put together a press release that went out the first week in October, timed for a specific reason, because we knew that the American Sport Fishing Association's meeting was that week. We dropped that press release the day that the American Sport Fishing Association Government Affairs Committee met. on purpose or the day before. So everybody saw it, it hit perfect. And it was an article on forward-facing sonar and the concerns that we have as an organization and Al Lindner had, because he, as a member, life member, he came in and was quoted numerous times in there about watching the effects forward-facing sonar has on the resource. That's all we were trying to do is just say, hey everybody, you know, we're not against forward-facing sonar at all. We use it, we love it, we catch more fish, but it has the potential, and it's not just forward-facing sonar. All technology has the potential to drastically affect a resource and quickly Brian Bashore (27:17) algae. Pat Neu (27:26) And we need, as anglers that care, we need to make sure that the organizations that are in charge of the resource, which would be the state agencies and the federal agencies for the oceans and in the Great Lakes for that matter, you know, NOAA, that they're all aware of this technology and what it can do. I mean, there's a few that might know that this technology exists. But right now, a limited number of people have it. And I'm talking forward facing sonar again. So it's $4,000 for you to have one unit in your boat and watch fish eat a lure. So there's a limited number of people that are going to spend that money. Some people are spending five times that because they've got five units in their boat. And everywhere you look, there's a screen that will show you what your lure is doing and how the fish is reacting. It's... Brian Bashore (28:17) Yep. Pat Neu (28:26) But our point isn't that that's bad. Our point is that it can have an effect if it becomes $1,000 in more of the general public can use it. And then we just got to get ahead of the game. So, you know, that's what we do is we go out there and we use our ability through networking and through the fact that we have a voice to make people, make everybody aware of things that can affect our future. Brian Bashore (28:57) Yeah, it's, I think we just had us on the last podcast is Tom when talking about that and he was correct. It's the responsible use of that, of that technology, you know, which obviously is going to protect your resource. It's, it's too early to tell. There's not really any science behind it. I know they're trying to do a little bit out there. Pat Neu (29:05) responsible use. but it's too early to tell. I mean, we just need to make sure that we do our part as influencers to work with, wherever possible, work with the agency responsible for managing the resource to make sure they're aware that this technology has changed the game. And when I say it's not just forward-facing sonar, it isn't. Because I would... Brian Bashore (29:18) It's a little too early to tell. Pat Neu (29:45) I tell you right now, within five years, on our units, on our boat, we will have software in there that uses moon phase, wind direction, water temperature, weather, brings it all together, uses AI and tells us what part, where on that lake to go catch that fish right now. And it's gonna be right 80% of the time. I guarantee you. It's coming and it's already somewhat open, but I guarantee you that on the average, on the unit center boat, that there will be, there will definitely be that technology. And that's just my guess, my gut feel as to knowing what I know about electronics and what they've got to be working on and what AI is doing, you know, artificial intelligence, which we just had a great speaker at our conference. Brian Bashore (30:16) It's already somewhat out there, so there's some apps that are out there. Pat Neu (30:44) talking about it, it's coming. And that's why as a trade association that's here to help professional anglers, we need to be talking about things like. Brian Bashore (30:58) Yes, yes we do. We got to stay on top of it and you guys are doing a great job at that. What, what's a membership look like? Somebody wants to get in, you know, a new guy, a high school angler, kid, uh, seasoned vet, someone looking to go just take that next step. What's their process to become a member of the MPA and help out. Pat Neu (31:18) Sure. You know, basically what we would like to see is any angler who has already taken a step from passion for angling to profession, whether full or part time, or is working to do so, which would include the student anglers, we would love to see them come on board and learn the correct way to take those steps. And they can do that. by being a member of the organization. So we've created this Student Angler membership for all these high school kids that are out there and the college kids that are fishing and love fishing. And many of them are thinking about what they're gonna do for a living. And there's a lot that would love to work in this industry. And I believe that becoming a member of our organization, paying attention to what matters for the... business side of the sport. If they get involved with that early, we're going to help create the, the new leaders of our industry through our organization. Cause not every one of them is going to become a tournament angler. It is not going to be Jay Shakur it, you know, where you can actually make a living doing it or, you know, I got a full-time guy. Brian Bashore (32:40) Thanks for watching! Pat Neu (32:47) They're just, they're not all going to do it. It's not going to be for them. But if they have an understanding of the sport and what matters and how, how the, the industry works, they can get involved in other, other parts of it. You know, my son's a great example. He's a great stick. I mean, he is good. You mean, I thought I could catch him. I'm horrible compared to him. And it's really, really great to see him. Brian Bashore (33:03) Well. Pat Neu (33:18) look at what was in front of them for opportunity in the industry, make a decision not to chase the, or go down the path that Jay Shakurat did, because you know, Jay Shakurat, green angler, phenomenal. He was in the back of my son's boat. You know, my son was 24 and Jay was 22 or 21, and Jay was a claw angler. My son was the pro on the, open BS open series. My son did really well. Jade did really well. But Adam made the decision that he is going to go down a different path. And he's now purchased how he's tackled in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin with a partner. And that's his path. And yet he can still fish tournaments on the weekends. He's, you know, he's winning money doing that. But he's also running a business that is successful. Brian Bashore (33:51) Thank you. Pat Neu (34:13) So he's a great example of a different way to become a full-time professional in the industry. Because he took that step toward making a living in the industry, but he did it through tournament angling. And, you know, now he's got his captain's license. He's going to do a little guiding. There's just different ways to do it. And that's why it's really important to have these student anglers involved. And then any angler that... that may be looking for a change in what they want to do for a living. I mean, Brian, you know as well as I do that you could work about every day in the year if you want to as a guide, and you worked hard at it and you promote. I mean, you know how many people are looking for that on the water experience that is a great experience. And it's a matter of being professional and it's a matter of working hard and promoting the business. Brian Bashore (34:48) Yeah. Yeah, I think people outside looking in think that these guys just get to go fishing every day for a living, but don't realize same with professional anglers, it's a, there's tournaments for two days, maybe three days. And that's all you see. You don't see everything that goes on behind the scenes or all year long. And realize that it's 90% promotion marketing tells 10% fishing time spent on the water. Pat Neu (35:36) Well, in preparation, I mean, it's, you're right. It's sales, but it's also running a business. So administration of the business, the buying the product, keeping receipts, because when you get to the point where you're making money, you've got to be able to, you know, you're going to have to pay taxes and you can offset, offset that income with, with expenses, but you have to do it right. You have to understand how to keep, you know, keep books and. Brian Bashore (35:54) Yep. Pat Neu (36:06) And that's all part of it. And that's what we teach. And it's critical for success. But there's so much opportunity out there. Brian Bashore (36:16) Yeah, I was going to test, I've seen it. Adam's a great example of fish in the open. And then, you know, looking at the financial, basically, you know, a situation of how they made a change a couple of years ago and what it's going to cost to fish and what's the reality of it and said, Hey, I'm going to still do what I love in fish tournaments. And you have some huge tournaments right there in Sturgeon Bay. And you've got a phenomenal, you know, bass fishery and walleye fishery, obviously. Pat Neu (36:29) Thanks. we do. Brian Bashore (36:40) You know, to, to purchase the tackle store and, and stay in it. Right. And it was great. I came to my first conference, maybe 10 years ago with Bill McGannon, who is founder and creator of walleye nations creations. We came to the conference and both left and you can see where we are today. You know, and those are all things. And most importantly, the people that you meet at these conferences or throughout the NPA, the network. You know what I mean? My first night I sat down and played poker with Ted Takasaki, which is the very first thing I was told when I showed up as Pat Neu (36:48) in your space. Brian Bashore (37:10) Don't play poker with Ted Takasaki. Well, I, and I don't play poker, but I played poker and Ted is my tournament traveling partner now and doesn't live too far from it played with Kavya's, uh, Jim Carroll, Scarless was sitting by me. Uh, Ron Linder was at my table. Those are things that you can't put a price on. So, I mean, the price for me was my 20 or $50 buy-in, which I gladly was donated to the, to the group. Pat Neu (37:10) Don't play poker with Ted Takasaki, yeah. That's correct. Brian Bashore (37:40) Uh, but for an hour or two to sit with those guys listed at the, the tales of tournaments or dis industry talk about stuff was, was priceless. And I think the first person I've met there was Tom Neustrom, um, went up and introduced self to him, talked to him, and he just started this drop in wisdom. Hey, you're new. These are things you need. Here's people you need to talk to. Here's things you need to know. This is kind of how it works. You know, I only have so many sponsors for a reason, blah, blah. Uh, you don't, you don't. Get this stuff anywhere else. You know, people aren't out there saying, Hey, I got this sponsorship and they pay me this, right? I have this sponsorship and I get this. They're not, you know, that's not for good reason in some sort of public information. Um, those are all found at the conferences, whether there are future conferences like that, I don't know, but there's a lot of resources. The NPA has, we'll put some links below to the, for members to look you up at the NPAA.net they can join, be a member. High school fishing is huge. Taken off. So we got that student angler, it's like 50 bucks or something, I think still maybe. Right. And of course we've got great, there's great partners involved and the members are receiving discounts on much of their products, you know, help these guys get out there and obviously promote those products and sales it, if you don't know about the MPA folks, you got to check it out. It is just a win-win for everything. Pat's done a phenomenal job of re kind of creating and building this and putting it out there. It's stronger than ever. We need to keep it that way. Moving forward. Pat Neu (38:42) $50. Brian Bashore (39:07) Especially why Pat is on his Twilight tour here this last year before he gets to stay down there in Florida permanently probably and bypass these Northern winters. Pat Neu (39:11) I am. Next year at this time, we need to do this again and I can give you even a different perspective on the industry. Brian Bashore (39:24) Right. It is speaking of the industry, what, where do you think it's at? What's our state of the industry kind of feeling like now state of sponsorships moving forward? Obviously we're in an election year. So, um, economy is. Nobody knows. Um, and WT posted their payouts for the coming year yesterday, um, which is just by anticipated, no change. Um, doesn't mean there won't be next year, you know, but there's obviously, you know, Pat Neu (39:42) Nobody knows. Brian Bashore (39:53) growing pains and new management and stuff like that. So I imagine they don't want to try to stir it up too fast, but where do you think the industry is heading? Pat Neu (40:04) Well, it's tough time for the industry right now. Um, you got to remember that the industry is comprised of boat and motor companies and tech and electronics companies and tackle companies, um, that are all out there looking to make sales. To people who, you know, the general public doesn't need to go fish. So they're not you, they're not a full-time guide or a part-time guide who makes a living fishing. So they don't necessarily need to buy a boat and motor or the best electronics. And when interest rates were three and a half or There were a lot of boats being sold. Um, and then you hit COVID when there was nothing else to do, but go fish. And then every single new and used boat in the country got sold overnight. Cause there was money coming back from the government, from incentives. I mean, everywhere we looked, there was money falling and people were buying boats and motors at record levels. Reality set back in now on top of that, you had inflation. Brian Bashore (41:02) Yep. Thank you. Pat Neu (41:24) and you add high interest rates, and you can imagine what's happened to sales of boats and motors in this country, both new and used. They're not moving, it's dead. I mean, it's 2009, 2010, dead if not worse. Brian Bashore (41:33) They're not moving. Well, you know, they went from $60,000 to $70,000 to $120,000. Pat Neu (41:46) in four years. I mean, it might have something to do with it. On top of that, when we were talking electronics, the electronics that go on these boats comprise about, I mean, if you rig them right, it's minimum 10%. Add the trolling motor in, it's 20 to 25% of the cost of the boat. And so, you know, they're... Brian Bashore (41:48) Yeah, might have a little bit of something to do with it, boat manufacturers. Pat Neu (42:14) those companies are not seeing the sales that they had. I mean, there was some residual left, there was filling the pipeline back up because it was empty. And so that's all slowing down. Same thing goes with high end rods and reels. Are people fishing? I think they're probably fishing more right now than they have in years. So, you know, the core tackle part of this, I don't think is heard anywhere near as bad. But There's some other stuff going on out there with the change in the industry that's affecting the industry as well on sponsorships. And that is, you know, the big companies that have been purchased by equity money. there because sales have slowed down, the equity money people are saying, well, what happened? And now they're looking at to cut, to cut their expenses. And you do that by cutting pro staff. You do that by cutting, like cutting your staff, you know, people that work for the companies and it's, it's kind of this big snowball that's rolling and it's affecting everybody at every company at every level. There are, are there some out there that are killing it because people are fishing? Yes, there are. There's some really good success stories, but overall it's pretty tough right now. So if, if you're coming in as a, as a individual who's looking for sponsorship, you know, right now, I think the thing that you need to be concentrating on is working with your local community. Banks, they're making money right now. They might have some money. They want to write loans. So go to the local bank and say, hey, there's a bunch of people that would like to buy boats. There's boats everywhere. There's good prices, comparably, and compared to where they were, I mean, there's good prices. I can help you promote your bank and the opportunity to go out there and write loans to these people who want to buy boats and motors. Brian Bashore (44:01) Mm-hmm. Right. Pat Neu (44:31) You know, there's opportunities with car dealers and there's opportunities with, you know, your local, your local car dealer, things that you can do. That are, you know, not first, you know, top of mind, this, that's who I'm going to go after for sponsorship, but there are things you can do with your local community that make good sense. Um, get involved with the local grocery chain and, or store and say, you know, we're going to have a fish fry weekend. Brian Bashore (45:00) Thank you. Pat Neu (45:01) you know, bring your boat out in front of the place and you go fry fish and they, you know, it doesn't have to be fresh caught fish, but I mean, you just gotta get creative. And you know what, it works. I mean, I did it. I know others that did it. There was an angler, Kim Papineau. He was from the UP, Asconaba to be exact, chief. He never had a national sponsor. Brian Bashore (45:03) you. Mm-hmm. Pat Neu (45:31) He fished the PWT on someone else's dime for years, all with local sponsors. And he had them all. He had the grocery store. He had the laundry mat. He had the, you know, the car dealerships. He had just so many and that's how he did it. That's really smart because they're going to be there no matter what. And if you get a good relationship with them, that's a great opportunity for you. So, you know, that you asked me about the industry. trying not to paint too bad a picture about the issue, because it's there, it's real. I mean, that's what you wanted to talk about and this is reality. So, you know, it's gonna be a tough year. I think it's gonna be tough couple of years until we get the election over and we start to see the direction of the country, direction of interest rates, so forth and so on. So, you know, we'll see. Brian Bashore (46:03) Hey, it's real. We're off talk. So it's real. This is... Yeah. And I mean, he just, you hit it, the nail on the head, it's relationships. So obviously locally you probably have some of those relationships are really established or built. Most people think about, Hey, I want to go into the, I want to term it a little local Derby. I'm going to Rapala, Berkeley or something. And they don't even realize that these companies are owned by a bigger company. You know, you know, pure fishing is 10 brands or more, right? GSM outdoors is 15, 20 companies. And most of them have hunting products as well on the same side, like Pratco is gonna fall underneath. Pat Neu (46:59) GSM, Pratt & Kahl, I mean, more and more of them are outdoor companies. Brian Bashore (47:01) Yeah. Right. They're not, I mean, Northland is a standalone example or a Z man where it's, you know, probably St. Croix in a sense, but there's not, there's not many, most of all these little products and stuff you see are all owned by somebody else and you're seeing they get sold, they get bought up. New people come in, new marketing managers, new pro staff coordinators and managers, which means you have to start over, you know, and there's also the huge misconception of sponsorship and pro staff. These are, these are not the same things that I don't think people quite realize. You'll see a guy's Facebook. Boom. He's got 40 pro staff things, right? And you're receiving a discounted lure. Okay. But you are, you're not a sponsored Angler. What, what does Pat consider a sponsored Angler? I'll give you my Pat Neu (47:59) I, in, in you, you brought up something that is concerned me for a long time. And that is you need to add value. If you're a sponsor to Angler, you're adding value to the equation and you're getting paid for adding the value. And the payment can come in free goods, substantial amount of free goods, you know, enough to make a difference. Because it's still offset in expense. And quite frankly, now they're sending out 10 99s on free goods, which they hadn't for decades. Um, or can it really, you're, you're sponsored when you're getting. You know, retainer you're, you're getting a check again, offset expenses or to add revenue to your business. So. You know, that's kind of where the line is, is where you're either getting significant free goods or you are getting a check as a, you know, retainer. Brian Bashore (49:03) which at that point the IRS is looking at you as a Pat Neu (49:07) sponsored angler in a business. Yep. Brian Bashore (49:09) professional angler. There's kind of the difference between a angler and professional angler in a sense, right? What's the government, what's a piece of what you're making? Pat Neu (49:21) You know, and it's, the government's part of this, but you mean the other part of it, and it's something that we teach and we harp on with NPAA and people get sick of it, but I'm trying to save their lives and their livelihood. If you're insured by the wrong company as a professional angler, and you haven't checked in to whether that company actually sponsors. are not sponsors of covers slash underwrites, a professional angler with their policies, you could have a problem. I mean, so, you know, we've got a worldwide marine underwriters, Bob Llewellyn, who specializes in making sure that professional anglers have the right insurance so that if they have an issue, and the issue's not as much theft or damage to the boat. as much as it is a liability issue where someone gets hurt either on the water or off the water and you're not covered with the right insurance. So. Brian Bashore (50:29) Yeah, Bob does a great job. I unfortunately had to move companies because he had some issues with insuring in South Dakota, um, through a new companies went through, but I would do a new company, but I've added from just that you're not always covered as most people aren't covered at all properly or the way they need to be covered period. Um, but as a guide, you obviously have a lot more, you know, covered you need for certain situations, whether you're picking them up at a resort and driving them to the boat ramp, you know, I found out that they're Pat Neu (50:36) Right. That's correct. Brian Bashore (50:58) You know, once they get back and long as they're at their resort all night, and it was still my trip, there's still on my coverage, you know, even once they're on somebody else's property to some weird things, why up that. But if I'm in the stores or sports shows doing seminars, you need that general liability policy. If you're demonstrating flipping a jig and you whack it in someone's eyeball. They're going to come after that. Say you're at a Cabela's or a Bass Pro shop. They, Oh, let's go sue Johnny for millions of dollars. That's where your coverage comes into, you know, to play that. And some of these. sponsors, that if you're on the sponsor level to where there's a, you know, a free product, some type of money exchange or product exchange, um, for real value, you're going to be required to carry that. Um, you talked on Bruce to Sean earlier, offshore tackle, Bruce and Nick, phenomenal company, awesome products. Always give Nick crap about like you build a product that never has to be replaced kind of business plan because it's so good, but it's Pat Neu (51:41) Absolutely. Yeah, that's an issue, but they're assuming you're going to lose them at some point. Brian Bashore (52:00) Right. And you do, and I've lost a few, you know, you and everybody will. Right. Everybody picks one up floating around on Lake Erie once in a while, but they have all sorts of other products, um, that are phenomenal, the guppy weight stuff. But part of their requirement with their pro staff is you have to be an MPA member. So that's a hundred dollar investment, you know, and you're going to get whatever you may get from them on return. Um, and I wish more companies would, would require that because just the amount of. Pat Neu (52:02) Put your name on it and we'll get it back. Absolutely. Brian Bashore (52:28) Knowledge that you've learned at conferences or you got a whole bunch of videos on your, on your Facebook and your YouTube channel, um, stuff that comes out through the members email list is just inundated you with information. Insurance is a huge one. That's something you discuss at conferences and you can connect them with the right people. The taxes, taxes are ridiculous. And most people don't understand them. Um, you can get at yourself in a quite the bind and pickle when you win, you know, if you've win in different States, you have to file in all those States that people just think. Pat Neu (52:40) It's huge. and don't do it right. Correct. Brian Bashore (52:58) This is great. They put the money to make, they spend it. Well, 25 or 40% of that is, you know, winnings, a capital gains tax. That now you have to pay and it sucks. So when it looks like you win a lot of money, that's still great. And you're still ahead, but the more you win, the more you pay. So a good accountant, good tax stuff is it's all good to know the pro staff side of things and where I look at it as different sponsorship is exactly what you touched on, you're getting, you know, Free lures don't feed my family, but you can like it offsets a cost that I know I'm gonna buy all this stuff Anyway, I need it or I'm gonna go through a ton of these things. So I'm saving that Retainers, you know a great way whether you're however you're doing it the pro staff side of things where people are pro staff They call themselves sponsorship a lot. It's not you're getting a discount on a product Theoretically, you're a field staff. They're giving you some stuff. Maybe they give you a few things to try out in exchange for Pat Neu (53:31) Thanks. Brian Bashore (53:53) a social media post or attending the show or whatever the case it is, but it's not a bad thing. It's where everybody has to start. I think it's don't, I mean, and understand it's a, it's a long game. So it's no, this is, it's perfectly cool that you want to get your foot in a door and you're on their pro staff and you're getting 50% off their tackle and you go buy a bunch and you're going to buy way more than you needed. But that, Hey, you're getting it for half price. Trust me, they're still making money on it. Um, maybe they give you some. Pat Neu (54:06) It's not going to happen overnight. Brian Bashore (54:23) And they're getting some promotion out of it, but you may have to do it for three, four, five years with that company until you can move up to the next level. If there is one. So the companies like to see that you're not just coming in and out. A lot of guys come in hot and say, I just won this tournament. I want this and I expect this. And for the most part, you're going to get no, you know, this is not there. Uh, attend ICAST, attend, you know, these, these shows that are, uh, You know, the classic I'm going to, I'm driving down the classic this year, cause it's close enough that I can just jump in and drive down for a few days and help out at St. Croix and Segar booth. You know. Pat Neu (55:01) And you can see several NPA members who are fishing the classic this year, like many. Brian Bashore (55:04) Yep. And I know, uh, Weezner is going to be there. Josh, so a guy from the walleye tours made the classic. Um, that's awesome. And, uh, Jay's there, right. Is in it. Pat Neu (55:14) Jay Shakurat, you've got Kyle Patrick who was our first life member. He's fishing the Classic. You've got Adam Rasmussen who's been a guide in a tournament angler for years, a walleye guy that switched to bass. He won an open event. He's fishing the Classic. So it's really cool to see NPA members. You know, there's more than that. If I look at the list, we're probably up to this year, I think we'll be probably be up to about 10 NPA members. Brian Bashore (55:18) Patrick? Yeah. Pat Neu (55:42) which is a big percentage of the total, the, the total. Yep. And, and, you know, you've got. Brian Bashore (55:47) Ike. You got Ike in early? KVD is a member. He'll be down there. He's not fishing it up. Wait, is he fishing it? Did he qualify? No, it's not. I know he's done, but he may have qualified, but. Pat Neu (55:55) not this year. No, no, it's not. But here's the point, Brian. I mean, and then the reality of this is that this industry is going to be here forever. You can make a living in it in a lot of different ways. And if you want to do that, I highly recommend you look at our organization and become a member, but do more than just become a member. You mentioned it earlier. If you just read the news blasts that we send out every Thursday around noon and the, the notes from the desk, which is our monthly newsletter that we send out once a month at the end of the month. If you just read what we send you, you will gain so much information that you will never have found on your own. That's a value to you. And you got your value out of the membership and that's just reading. That isn't even then taking the next step in networking. And, you know, if and when we're able to have another conference, you know, go to the conference and learn. You know, next year, I can tell you right now, we are not having a quote unquote conference. We'll have a meeting probably in the upper Midwest, probably the first weekend in January again. Um, it's not going to be a conference because we just can't do that moving forward because we We went through several years of major losses for various reasons. So we got to reboot. I love conferences. I think they're significant value. You've been at great conferences. You saw, you know, some of the best speakers in the industry speak. You know, you saw Al Lindner, you saw Johnny Morris, you saw Mike Iaconelli. You know, you saw Jacob Wheeler. You were, you were there for all of that. And KVD, I think you were there in 2018 when he was there, in talking about business, the conferences will come back at some point, but we need members and we need members to engage. Come to the conference and don't come to drink and to socialize, or play poker. Come to nightly activity, that's fine, that's part of it. But really the reason you're coming there is to learn. Brian Bashore (58:13) All right, that is a nightly activity. Pat Neu (58:20) And that's the real reason. And then the, the. what we put out in these conferences, if you look at the agenda and you look at the speaker list, you can't find that information anywhere else, period. Just not available anywhere else. The good news is we have conferences archived, the content that we delivered going all the way back to 2018. We're gonna take that, we're gonna go through all of it and we're going to put it in a form where members will be able to access it. But then the key is you the member need to go out there and actually listen to this stuff. Learn. I mean it's an educational process. It's all we got all this great content. It's going to be up to you to get value and to have you take the next step and better your business and better your opportunity to make a living. You're going to have to work at it and learn. And we've got already right now. I can tell you we've got enough content that it'll blow people's minds. Actually, we have too much. We have to filter it to take the best of the best. Brian Bashore (59:31) And it's always evolving. So it was taught one year is good information, but I guarantee you next year, things have changed, especially when we're dealing with the marketing side of things. And all of that is due to technology for the most part. It's, it's good stuff. It's just, I mean, I remember talking to Johnny Morris at the conference, you know, obviously first time he'd been to one he's walking around and, you know, and we're sitting at lunch and he's like, wow, you know, not only there are 250, 300 people, these are all like minded people. Pat Neu (59:41) technology. That was amazing. Yep. Correct. Brian Bashore (59:58) They're all here for the same thing. They're all his customers, you know, and they're, they're all there for the same thing and they have the same goal. They love the outdoors. They love fishing. You know, the passion, you can just see it as every vendor booth is set up and everybody's playing with the new gadget rod, real lure, just like kids in a candy store for the first time. It's, you know, it's awesome. Pat Neu (01:00:19) Even Johnny Morris saw it. I mean, that was amazing. You know, when he... Brian Bashore (01:00:22) The funniest thing was he was buying up the products that I came and said, I said, you know, you have these in your store, Johnny. He's like, Oh, whatever. You know, it was buying up a handful of them. Pat Neu (01:00:33) Yeah, it was amazing. It was amazing. It was a great, it was 2020 just prior to the world understanding COVID was here. So, you know, Brian, I want to thank you for this opportunity. I think that unfiltered discussion like this. Brian Bashore (01:00:39) Yeah, we're lucky we beat that by about a month. So. Pat Neu (01:00:52) makes the difference. And again, the more people that can see a podcast like this and see the value of the NPA over and above, you know, what's in it for me, that's what drives the world, right? What's in it for me? Well, what's in it for you is much larger than just a hundred dollar a year member fee if you take advantage of everything that's there. And if you join for the Brian Bashore (01:01:08) Oh yeah. Pat Neu (01:01:20) right reason. not to get a discount on something, but you're joining to make a difference to your business and your love for the sport, for the future of the industry, for the future of our organization, for the future of the resources. It's priceless. And $100 is nothing. So I'd love to, you know, one of the things you said is, you know, leave a tip or a nugget for your listeners. The tip is if you're going to be a professional angler, you need to be a member of this organization, not for our benefit, but for yours. It's that simple. And, you know, there's a lot of misconceptions about the definition of professional angler. I can tell you this, anybody who's taking that step from passion to profession, whether full or part-time, is an angling professional or will become one. It's, and that's the key. You don't have to go out and be in fish a circuit full time or be the, you know, a full time guide in an area, but they are professional anglers and so are the ones that do it on the weekends and are aspiring to do it full time. And there's a lot out there. So we'd love to have you as members. You can go to NPAA.net and click on become a member. Brian Bashore (01:02:38) There is. I'll put that link below and it is literally that easy folks. A fisherman can do it. So not a cave man. It is that so simple. A fisherman can do it. It's so simple. Just hit that link below, drop in, join the MPA, be a member, enhance your career, you know, further your professionalism in the sport, meet people. It's a hundred dollars. I mean, you, you just can't put a price on it. Really. Um, it's a good round number to throw out there that helps, you know, Pat Neu (01:02:53) He's correct. It is. Yeah, that's true. Correct. Brian Bashore (01:03:16) move the needle forward. uh, that's Ted, uh, Pat's giving you some great insight and scoop on the industry and where we're heading, where we're at. So thank you a ton for your time today, Pat. And, uh, we look forward to seeing you real soon. And to all of you listeners, just npaa.net down here below, click on lead links and subscribe to become a member and stay in the news, stay in the loop on what's going on in the industry to make yourself a better So. Pat Neu (01:03:29) Absolutely. Thanks for the opportunity. Brian Bashore (01:03:45) Thanks for tuning into this episode of Real Talk Fishing.