I personally think many do this because of how the "Pro Hunters" jump ship so easily. I get BPS hunting catalog every year and in 2012, a famous husband and wife were quoted in the catalog saying Cuddeback was the best cam and that is all they will ever use. Then, 2013, this same duo is saying the exact thing about WGI. Money talks for a lot of them. There is no brand loyalty. A guy that loves a Chevy, loves a Chevy. One that loves a Ford, loves a Ford. You couldn't melt them in pour them into anything else. Many of us use the products we do because they work for us. There are no kickbacks. We can give you a 1000 reasons why a certain product is worth the money. ASK ANY THERMACELL OWNER AND YOU WILL SEE WHAT I MEAN! Lone Wolf users love them. Covert camera owners love them. SticnPic owners love them. I can go on and on. Being on a Pro Staff would be really cool. I hope to one day be on one. I can't see EVER endorsing something that I personally don't use or believe in.
I know it isn't true for all, but I personally cannot imagine saying you support a product or worse yet serving as a pro staff member of a company/product that I do not 100% stand behind.
even if you believe in a product 100 percent that you are a prostaff for you are still going to give a very biased review about it everyone knows that. everytime i read a post about something that prostaff will comment on i automatically skip over there post. this site has even pushed me away from using a certain product due to the prostaff pushing it so hard.
That's a pretty narrow minded approach. It's been my experience that low level pro staffers give honest reviews as long as they steer clear of comparing to other companies... It's easy to recognize the BSer Waddell wannabes that just blow smoke about how great something is.
How many products do we need in the deer woods? I mean really. Grab a bow, some arrows, maybe a treestand.....and KILL.
You mean I don't need carbon clothing, deer calls, scents, trail cams, scent eliminators, realtrees newest pattern, etc to kill a deer? Blasphemy! That being said, I don't think I could honestly be part of a team if I had to push something I didn't like. I used to think it would have been cool, but now it's just kind of ehhhh to me.
According to a certain someone I am friends with on facebook you need everything from what is holding your bow to a wrist strap thingy to keep release from flopping down....dude posts a new "pro staff" product seemingly every week....pro-staff *****s are just not my thing at all, I think it erodes slightly at how meaningful your word about the products are when you have so many of them or switch them from year to year.
I've said it before and I'll say it again, what things look like from the outside is usually not the case. I can't think of a single "pro" that wants to jump from company to company. They're not stupid and they realize this makes them look just as bad as the companies they're working with. Just like my statement above you have no idea what really happened. Let's just assume for a minute that the first company decided they no longer wanted to pay for the services of said professionals, either because they could no longer afford it or decided to part ways for other reasons. Should those people no longer be allowed to work for another company in a similar field? Or should they simply be loyal and agree to work for less money, or for free? Everyone always assumes that the 2nd company was simply willing to pay more money than the first and I can assure you 99% of the time this isn't the case. I see a lot of this sentiment expressed by people online who have never been in this situation. Most don't truly realize this is a job for these professionals. It's how they pay their mortgage, their car payment and put food on the table for their family. What would you do if your employer no longer wanted to pay you for your services? Or wanted to cut your salary? Or simply fired you? My guess is you'd go find a new employer and nobody on the Internet would call you a sellout. Keep in mind this goes both ways. Many pros put themselves and their names out there to support a company or a product only to have the rug pulled out from under them somewhere down the road. The day you rely on endorsement income to pay your bills then we'll talk. Now back to Tom's original question - yes, I think there's plenty of guys out there who want to be on a pro staff just to say they're on a pro staff. Many think it will eventually lead them to bigger and better things and that they're going to be the next Waddell or Shockey. I'm sure this isn't all people but I believe it's a fair amount of them.
There you go trying to inform us with insider facts and common sense when we have our minds made up with no clue what really goes on. You do know this is the internet. You are sucking the fun out of it. Knock it off !!!!! Face it... you are a pimp and the pro staffers are your ho's. It has to be true cause I read it on the internet. Seriously, I look at a person whether he is a pro staffer or not and decide if he/her advice is worth taking a serious look from past experiences. You usually can figure out pretty easy who gives good advice and who doesn't. Tim
I found a solution to this problem, I created my own "Pro-staff" and appointed myself a pros-staff member.
Justin your argument obviously holds true and have merit... but the hunting industry "paying the bills" likely applies to less than 10% of all the prostaffers out there. The vast majority still have day jobs and hunting is their passion/hobby.
Agreed, but I was referring to Sam's comment specifically which is why I quoted it. I addressed the original question at the end of my mini-rant.
That's a pretty weak approach. As a "pro staff" member and writer for bowhunting.com, I can certainly say that my reviews are far from biased. If there is a product that I simply don't like, I simply don't talk about it. I don't have to give false or biased reviews, I just don't say anything. If the product is quality, I will state that. There isn't a product out there that is perfect, everybody in their right mind is aware of this, I'll never say that there is and in most of my product reviews, I'll state what I like and what I don't. In fact there are couple of product manufacturers that will not speak to me because I gave an honest opinion of their product in a review/blog on this site. Guess what, the problem I identified was changed the next year. (I'll send anyone that can figure out which product that was a free sweatshirt :D) At the end of the day, you make your own decisions, shoot what you want, when you want, at whatever you want. Saying you get "pushed" away from a certain product because of the prostaff is pretty ridiculous. You should give whatever that product is, a chance to push you away itself. You will find jackasses associated with every product on the market, no way around that. Keep in mind that the MAJORITY of pro staff members do not receive compensation, maybe free product at best.
I am squirting rub line slime all over my body next year. I am coupling that with duct taping the largest ozonics device I can find to my head. I will be unstoppable.
