Cabela's "VIP" Treatment
I was really excited to get a VIP invitation to the grand opening of the Scarborough, Maine Store.
So I started bragging about it, and found out that most of the folks I knew had gotten the same thing. I asked my friend Jay to go with me (because you could invite a guest) and we went to the store. Basically, the thing started at 2:00, and they were going to kick everyone out at 4:15, then take the tarp off the sculpture and let every one in. I had to RSVP, and even give them my guest's name. I figured maybe for personalized free stuff.
So when we got to the store, it turned out that everyone in Maine, seemingly, had an invitation. We had to park probably a quarter mile from the store. When we got to the velvet rope, they were checking that every pair of people had the invitation in hand. "They'll check you against the list inside," I thought.
Once inside there were no freebies, like the ones I got in Wheeling. Just handed a card inviting us to get a credit card. No list, not even like a name tag. There was no need to RSVP at all, except it gave them feedback and email addresses. And the place was packed; I was starting to feel like a VUP (very unimportant person).
A few years ago, I was humiliated when Cabela's failed to send me their new hard-bound master catalog prior to Deer Camp. I'd spent over $1500 with them that year and was the only one who buys a lot of gear who didn't receive one. It was torture, and I have not spent much money at Cabela's since. I was starting to feel that way again.
They have some pretty cool stuff inside. The taxidermy mountain is the centerpiece of the store. You can see a really good picture of it on their web site, but you can't see the mountain from the perspective in the picture. In fact, most of the pictures appear to be taken from a scissor lift, and the space does not feel as grand as their photos indicate.
This moose taxidermy is standing in water.
There is every kind of animal from just about every continent on display. I suppose much of it is plastic, I mean, they have a rhino. Next to this moose is a few mule deer, and there is a ram at the top of the mountain. "Cool," I thought. But as I wandered around the store looking at rows of pronghorns, I kept wondering, where's the connection to Maine?
I saw Blaine and Patti Carter and we discussed how LL Bean missed the boat about 20 years ago. Cabela's put their marketing towards hunters; Bean concentrated on Preppies and ever-changing fashions. Bean made a serious faux-pas a couple of years ago putting the hunting department outside in a separate store, and selling stuff where the profits go to buying land and making it non-hunting in Maine. Some of their employees look down their noses at you when you come into the store in camo and orange. And their hunting products lack innovation and lag Cabela's by a year or two. LL Bean is a dirty word among many Maine hunters.
Bean has 10 stores; Cabela's has 27 with 5 under construction. With Cabela's location, it's going to be hard for hunters, especially the ones from Massachusetts that bring cash into Maine, to pass up Cabela's convenience and selection.
So I started bragging about it, and found out that most of the folks I knew had gotten the same thing. I asked my friend Jay to go with me (because you could invite a guest) and we went to the store. Basically, the thing started at 2:00, and they were going to kick everyone out at 4:15, then take the tarp off the sculpture and let every one in. I had to RSVP, and even give them my guest's name. I figured maybe for personalized free stuff.
So when we got to the store, it turned out that everyone in Maine, seemingly, had an invitation. We had to park probably a quarter mile from the store. When we got to the velvet rope, they were checking that every pair of people had the invitation in hand. "They'll check you against the list inside," I thought.
Once inside there were no freebies, like the ones I got in Wheeling. Just handed a card inviting us to get a credit card. No list, not even like a name tag. There was no need to RSVP at all, except it gave them feedback and email addresses. And the place was packed; I was starting to feel like a VUP (very unimportant person).
A few years ago, I was humiliated when Cabela's failed to send me their new hard-bound master catalog prior to Deer Camp. I'd spent over $1500 with them that year and was the only one who buys a lot of gear who didn't receive one. It was torture, and I have not spent much money at Cabela's since. I was starting to feel that way again.
They have some pretty cool stuff inside. The taxidermy mountain is the centerpiece of the store. You can see a really good picture of it on their web site, but you can't see the mountain from the perspective in the picture. In fact, most of the pictures appear to be taken from a scissor lift, and the space does not feel as grand as their photos indicate.
This moose taxidermy is standing in water.
There is every kind of animal from just about every continent on display. I suppose much of it is plastic, I mean, they have a rhino. Next to this moose is a few mule deer, and there is a ram at the top of the mountain. "Cool," I thought. But as I wandered around the store looking at rows of pronghorns, I kept wondering, where's the connection to Maine?
I saw Blaine and Patti Carter and we discussed how LL Bean missed the boat about 20 years ago. Cabela's put their marketing towards hunters; Bean concentrated on Preppies and ever-changing fashions. Bean made a serious faux-pas a couple of years ago putting the hunting department outside in a separate store, and selling stuff where the profits go to buying land and making it non-hunting in Maine. Some of their employees look down their noses at you when you come into the store in camo and orange. And their hunting products lack innovation and lag Cabela's by a year or two. LL Bean is a dirty word among many Maine hunters.
Bean has 10 stores; Cabela's has 27 with 5 under construction. With Cabela's location, it's going to be hard for hunters, especially the ones from Massachusetts that bring cash into Maine, to pass up Cabela's convenience and selection.
Ok, I've had a lot of folks say they are disappointed in the size of this Cabela's. At 130,000 sqft. the showroom is pretty big, but not super huge. The average Cabela's showroom is 144,500, the median is 150,000 and the mode is 185,000. So the store is smaller than average, but still well within one standard deviation of the mean. In statistical terms: "normal" sized.
Well, Walmart just opened a new store within 25 miles of three other Walmarts. It's 192,000 square feet.
So, yes, I kind of understand when a Cabela's store finally came to Maine, which is the historic hunting and fishing destination for not just Boston and Hartford, but New York and Philadelphia, and your typical Mainer walks in and it feels smaller than his local Walmart, well it's kind of understandable it would feel small.
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