2012 Vintage Cup

[Bindlestiff]

I went this year and was joined by my two sons and had a great day. Neither of them shoot or hunt and I think they enjoyed it to the point that the next time I ask they will be eager to tag along. Good stuff for me.

Anyway, I just returned from having a brew with one of my sons and we were talking about shooting sporting clays and he had a novel view point. He thought that sporting clays was being marketed wrong and they are missing out on a big business opportunity. I can see his point and want to share it here.

His thought was it should be more like paint ball or golf from a marketing point of view. If one people that didn't shoot wanted to try it or someone wanted to set up a bachelor party or a company wanted a bonding outing event, they can go play a round of golf or shoot paint ball but not sporting clays.

Why, because golf or paint ball has instruction for the uninitiated and equipment to provide to individuals in those kinds of situations. If a sporting clays location would advertise like the scaled Indy race car track South of Boston does or like paint ball courses do to get groups there, then they would get younger people involved and expand the exposure to sporting clays. But that would include having instructions for first time shooters and rental equipment (shotguns) too.

Much like golf, new people that never played get instructions so the feel knowledgeable and comfortable on the course their first time out and so to would new shooters on a sporting clays course. With rental equipment, someone that doesn't shoot can try it without investing money in a gun. This lack of equipment to "give it a try" probably stops lots of curious people from learning about sporting clays and limits our pool of shooters.

With a little marketing and a relatively small investment in some good reliable and inexpensive shotguns (Rem 1100 for example) and course instructors/monitors, the sport could really grow.

My sons had a great day and would do I believe will shoot many times in the future, but without me to provide a little guidance and provide the guns they would never have been exposed to sporting clays.

Thoughts?