Cabela's called tourist destination, sells wild boar sandwiches

[Guest guest]

Cabela's " entertainment centers " make hunting defenseless animals

seem like a game. They also support and promote the cruel Iditarod.

(For information on the race: http://www.helpsleddogs.org )

 

Letters to editor: letters

 

Posted on Sat, May. 14, 2005

 

A new big fish in the pond

 

By Heather Landy

Star-Telegram Staff Writer

 

FORT WORTH - Over the past few decades, sporting goods retailers

ranging from mom and pop shops to Wal-Mart Supercenters have learned

to compete with Cabela's, the catalog merchant. Now they must learn

to compete with Cabela's, the tourist destination.

 

The outdoor-gear juggernaut from Sidney, Neb., has parlayed its $1

billion mail-order business into a burgeoning retail chain with 10

locations and eight more on the way, including one in Fort Worth that

opens May 26. Company officials expect the store, at Interstate 35W

and Texas 170, to attract between 4 million and 6 million visitors a

year, which would make Cabela's a bigger draw than the Alamo, Six

Flags Over Texas or the Texas State Fair.

 

The 230,000-square-foot, 575-employee store is a Cabela's catalog

come to life, with more than 200,000 hunting, fishing and camping

items in stock, along with a gun library, aquariums, an African game

diorama and other Disneyesque visuals. Texas will get its second

Cabela's store June 30 in Buda, just outside Austin.

 

" The majority of the people I've talked to are really excited about

Cabela's coming, " said Keller resident and Cabela's catalog customer

Doug Jones, who hunts and fishes and is starting to teach his young

children about the outdoors. " Any time I can find a retailer where I

can pick up things for the kids is good, too. "

 

The Fort Worth store, which also has clothing and furniture

departments as well as a café serving elk and wild boar sandwiches,

is expected to lure curious shoppers from a wide area. On any given

day, half the customers at a Cabela's store have driven at least 100

miles to get there, according to the company's research.

 

Cabela's will join an already crowded field of merchants appealing to

North Texas' outdoor sports enthusiasts. Bass Pro Shops Outdoor

World, the retailer most often compared with Cabela's, sits less than

28 miles to the east at Grapevine Mills.

 

Other, less theatrical stores have also cropped up in recent years,

such as Academy Sports, REI, Dick's Sporting Goods, Oshman's and

Gander Mountain. They in turn compete with general merchants such as

Wal-Mart, as well as the handful of independent shops that have

managed to survive in the wake of the big chains and giant mail-order

services.

 

" When we came in 20 years ago, it was mainly catalogs " competing for

sales, said Al Dalton, co-owner of Texas Outdoors, a 10,000-square-

foot hunting and fishing shop on Southwest Boulevard in Fort

Worth. " When Academy opened here, it took a little bit away. Then the

second Academy came and took a little bit. Then Bass Pro opened, and

it took a little bit. And there's only so much of that type of

business here. "

 

Eric Walsh, whose family owns Elk Castle Shooting Sports on West

Freeway in Fort Worth, added an indoor pistol range to the store in

December 2003 to attract more customers. The small shop, open for 52

years, also emphasizes services that big chains do not typically

offer, such as gunsmithing and warranty repairs. " We just redefine

our niche and carve out a little bit deeper of a segment of a smaller

group, " Walsh said.

 

Avid outdoorsman Dan Craine, a longtime customer of both independent

stores, said he may buy a few odds and ends from Cabela's when he

cannot find them anywhere else. But the Fort Worth resident said he

has several reasons for avoiding Cabela's.

 

" I don't wish them any ill will, but I sure want to protect and do

business with our local merchants first. They're local people, and

their money stays here, " said Craine, owner of Miller Distributing in

Fort Worth. " Will [Cabela's] prices be cheaper? They probably will.

But how much time and gas will I spend going out there? I'm not sure

it's such a bargain. But I think it will be perceived as a bargain by

a great number of people. "

 

According to the most recent figures from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife

Service, Texans spent about $3 billion on hunting, fishing and

wildlife-watching equipment in 2001.

 

Several big retailers are banking on continued growth of that number.

 

Dick's Sporting Goods, which took over the Galyan's stores in

Arlington and Frisco when it bought the chain last year, has big

expansion plans for the area - even after Cabela's arrival. " Clearly

it's a market that can support a lot more than two of our stores, "

said Jeff Hennion, senior vice president of strategic planning for

the Pittsburgh-based chain.

 

Bass Pro Shops is also set to grow in Texas, with stores scheduled to

open next year in Garland and San Antonio. " It's a big enough trade

area, " Bass Pro spokesman Larry Whiteley said. " We don't anticipate

[Cabela's] having a big effect on us. "

 

But major chains such as Bass Pro, with 27 superstores, and Dick's

Sporting Goods, with 234 locations, may have a better chance than a

small shop such as Texas Outdoors when it comes to thriving alongside

Cabela's.

 

" We don't have the buying power, and we don't have the advertising

dollars, " Dalton said. " It doesn't make any difference even if we've

got the best price in town if nobody knows about it. The deep

pockets, in every way, it makes a lot of difference. "

 

Dalton and his partner, Robert Cantrell, are also concerned about the

city's role in creating what they call an " unlevel playing field " by

granting Cabela's $41.6 million in economic incentives to build in

Fort Worth in the hopes that the store will spur nearby

development. " If we had a $40 million tax abatement, we could

certainly do a little better, " Dalton said.

 

Academy Sports Chairman David Gochman also spoke out against the

incentives when the City Council began considering them last

spring. " This is not a nonprofit, not a library, not a school -- they

are a for-profit business, a competitor of ours, along with Oshman's

and Wal-Mart and others, " he said at the time. Academy did not

receive any incentives to come to Fort Worth.

 

Dick's Sporting Goods also does not expect to win, or ask for, tax

abatements to expand here. " Our goal is to deliver everything at the

lowest price, " Hennion said. " We really don't feel like we should be

using customers' money to build our stores. "

 

Cabela's sits in a tax increment financing district, or TIF, for

which property taxes from new development will be diverted into a

special fund to pay for improvements inside the district. Cabela's

agreed to purchase $30 million of bonds issued by the TIF, which

means that as the TIF pays off the debt, Cabela's will collect the

interest. The TIF money was earmarked not just for roads and

utilities but also for tourist features inside the store.

 

Cabela's has been securing similar incentive packages for its other

new stores to make its construction costs more economical. Government

entities have been agreeing to the deals " because of the multiplier

effect that occurs when you put a destination retailer in place, "

said Kevin Rhodes, director of real estate at Cabela's. In Kansas

City, Mo., and other markets where the chain has opened, hotels,

restaurants and other retailers soon followed.

 

If there is a silver lining for competitors, the Cabela's store,

unlike the company's Web site or catalog, must charge sales tax on

purchases. But the prospect of paying 8.25 percent sales tax probably

won't do much to deter consumers from the store, analysts said.

 

" Cabela's has such a mystique because so many people have ordered

from them for years from the catalog, " said retail consultant Britt

Beemer, chairman of America's Research Group. " I think some people

have gotten a little jaded about superstores because they see so many

big boxes, but when you love camping and you love outdoors stuff and

you see a Cabela's, you begin to swoon. "

 

Which leaves rivals in search of some swoon-inducing tricks of their

own.

 

Heather Landy, (817) 390-7725

hlandy