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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide

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Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,

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Speaker 1: creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.

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Speaker 1: First Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host

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Speaker 1: Tony Peterson.

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Speaker 2: Hey, everyone, welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundation's podcast,

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Speaker 2: which has brought to you by First Late. I'm your host,

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Speaker 2: Tony Peterson. In today's episode is all about the money

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Speaker 2: involved in whitetail hunting and why that matters to all

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Speaker 2: of us. Look, there's a secret in the hunting industry

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Speaker 2: that no one's going to tell you about, because honestly,

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Speaker 2: we need you to keep buying stuff, and we need

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Speaker 2: you to keep thinking that all of us are super

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Speaker 2: rad hunters who can do what no one else can, which,

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Speaker 2: if you believe that, will make you more likely to

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Speaker 2: buy stuff from us. The big money thing in whitetails

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Speaker 2: is kind of insane, and it's only getting worse. It's

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Speaker 2: also kind of bullshit, and I think we need to

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Speaker 2: talk about it, which is what I'm gonna do right now.

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Speaker 2: A long, long, long time ago, I happened to catch

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Speaker 2: an episode of Ted Nugent's show. I know some people

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Speaker 2: love Uncle Ted, some people hate him. I don't really

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Speaker 2: want to get into that. I did help interview him

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Speaker 2: early in my career and it was an eye opener,

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Speaker 2: and not in a way that made me want to

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Speaker 2: interview him again. I'll leave it there now. On this show,

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Speaker 2: Ted was hunting in northern Wisconsin, which was of particular

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Speaker 2: interest to me for obvious reasons. Now, when he killed

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Speaker 2: a giant, and I do mean a giant velvet antler buck,

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Speaker 2: I thought, what the hell is going on here? The

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Speaker 2: Wisconsin opener is mid September, which you know, usually means

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Speaker 2: you rarely see any buck in velvet let alone like

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Speaker 2: a two hundred inch type of deer. So I looked

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Speaker 2: up the outfitter and I found out that it was

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Speaker 2: a high fence operation, which meant that he didn't need

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Speaker 2: to hunt that deer within the confines of the state regulations,

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Speaker 2: you know, since it's livestock and not wildlife. I then

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Speaker 2: looked up the price to shoot a buck of that caliber,

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Speaker 2: and it was around twenty thousand dollars at that operation.

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Speaker 2: I remember thinking a couple things like, if you have

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Speaker 2: twenty k to drop out a deer, you could certainly

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Speaker 2: find an easy hunt with lower fences. Then I remember

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Speaker 2: thinking it's probably pretty likely he didn't need to pay

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Speaker 2: the full twenty thousand dollars for that buck, given the

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Speaker 2: exposure the outfitter would get from the show. I've had

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Speaker 2: quite a few experiences as a casual consumer of outdoor

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Speaker 2: content and quite a few more as an insider that

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Speaker 2: have exposed me to the money that is involved in

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Speaker 2: deer hunting, and honestly, while it's a huge part of

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Speaker 2: the game, it's also something that is very rarely discussed.

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Speaker 2: After all, pretty much every person who is a hunting

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Speaker 2: influencer wants you to believe that they are relatable. Every

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Speaker 2: brand that makes bows and broadheads and guns and clothing

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Speaker 2: and everything related to hunting also wants to be attached

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Speaker 2: to that relatable sentiment. Not every brand, I guess, since

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Speaker 2: there are some premium you know, luxury guns and other

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Speaker 2: items that are marketed exclusively to this small percentage of

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Speaker 2: outdoor folks you know who can afford such things, and

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Speaker 2: you know probably sheep hunt on a regular But mostly

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Speaker 2: everyone wants to be as relatable as possible because that

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Speaker 2: builds brand loyalty and moves the revenue needle. But the

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Speaker 2: truth is that big money is such an advantage I

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Speaker 2: really don't even know how to overstate it. So let

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Speaker 2: me start at the bottom of this one and talk

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Speaker 2: about yours. Truly. One of the huge reasons I started

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Speaker 2: hunting public land and trying to kill deer where anyone

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Speaker 2: else could is because I was broke as a joke

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Speaker 2: at the time and just as fed up with the

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Speaker 2: hunting industry as a lot of people are today. I'd

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Speaker 2: spent a couple of years editing articles for people who

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Speaker 2: mostly had really really good deer hunting in places like Iowa,

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Speaker 2: but who were writing articles for people who definitely didn't

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Speaker 2: have access to that kind of ground. It left a

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Speaker 2: bad taste in my mouth because candy land hunts aren't

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Speaker 2: what most hunters have access to. So I set out

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Speaker 2: on the public land thing and tried to be relatable,

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Speaker 2: and you know what, it worked. But I had so

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Speaker 2: many advantages for starters. I wasn't paying for most of

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Speaker 2: my gear. I was paying for my tags and travel

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Speaker 2: at the time, but that was all right off, and

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Speaker 2: killing deer, at least in a roundabout way, was my job,

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Speaker 2: so it wasn't like I had to worry about leaving

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Speaker 2: the woods to go work somewhere else to make the

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Speaker 2: money that allowed me to get back to the woods.

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Speaker 2: I'll never forget posting photos of two public land bucks

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Speaker 2: I killed in the same weekend, one in North Dakota

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Speaker 2: and one in Wisconsin, if I'm remembering things correctly, And

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Speaker 2: someone posted that they can't believe anyone can kill bucks

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Speaker 2: like that on public land. That made me feel pretty good.

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Speaker 2: But that person undoubtedly had fewer advantages than I did.

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Speaker 2: Even a bottom of the barrel kind of fella like

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Speaker 2: me has so many advantages. It's really not the same thing.

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Speaker 2: And whether you believe this or not, it's one of

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Speaker 2: the primary reasons I keep trying to hunt hard places.

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Speaker 2: For the most part, I think that that is at

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Speaker 2: least partially our duty, even if it means shooting smaller

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Speaker 2: deer and eating more tags. But you might have noticed

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Speaker 2: that not everyone who hunts public land as a forward

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Speaker 2: facing individual is settling for two year old eight pointers.

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Speaker 2: Every year. You might see some of these folks killing

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Speaker 2: absolute giants over and over. You think that happens without

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Speaker 2: a lot of money, It doesn't, and it doesn't happen

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Speaker 2: usually without lots and lots of money. Sure, someone can

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Speaker 2: get really good at home state hunts where they can

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Speaker 2: put in tons of time or maybe stringed together to

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Speaker 2: a few good bucks in multiple states, but over a

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Speaker 2: long enough timeline it usually just levels out to good years,

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Speaker 2: bad years, and a base level consistency that's higher than

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Speaker 2: your average hunter. Now that exists, and there are some

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Speaker 2: very very good hunters out there who have made a

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Speaker 2: name for themselves by not having a giant bank account

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Speaker 2: but working really hard at hunting and being students of

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Speaker 2: the game. But there are a lot of folks who

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Speaker 2: have access to money most of us couldn't even dream about,

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Speaker 2: and they can buy information, they can pay for exclusive access,

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Speaker 2: and generally enlist all of the help that deep pockets

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Speaker 2: can buy. Recently filmed the show with a cameraman who

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Speaker 2: has worked all over the industry and who knows a

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Speaker 2: hell of a lot of cameramen, and he dropped a

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Speaker 2: few stories of bucks being saved for big name folks

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Speaker 2: who paid unbelievable money for the opportunity, you know, money

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Speaker 2: like fifteen to twenty thousand dollars to reserve the opportunity

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Speaker 2: to hunt specific bucks that are known and advertised by outfitters.

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Speaker 2: You ever notice how you never hear about what someone

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Speaker 2: pays to go hunt and shoot giant deer at outfitters.

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Speaker 2: It's because it would make most folks just not care

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Speaker 2: about the deer. I think we all know that, but

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Speaker 2: we don't really know the like nitty gritty details of that.

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Speaker 2: There has been a long history of buying opportunities that

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Speaker 2: giant deer on private land. There is a more recent

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Speaker 2: reality of buying information leading to big public land deer

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Speaker 2: as well as Western critters. Is it illegal, Nope, But

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Speaker 2: to that cloud the water is a bit on what

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Speaker 2: we are all doing with ourselves. I think so. It's

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Speaker 2: not just that, though, because the big money has to

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Speaker 2: get to the folks who are paying that big money

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Speaker 2: for the A buddy of mine used to handle accounts

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Speaker 2: for several big outdoor brands. He was responsible for tying

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Speaker 2: up influencers with marketing budgets. One fellow they were working

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Speaker 2: with turned down a contract they offered up that was

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Speaker 2: worth two hundred grand for one brand. There was a

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Speaker 2: breakdown in there of you know, actual straight cash, a

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Speaker 2: hunt budget, and a gear budget, but the whole compensation

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Speaker 2: package was two hundred thousand dollars. Does that sound pretty relatable?

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Speaker 2: It's not, and that money buys a lot of big,

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Speaker 2: dead critters, which keeps the whole snowball rolling along. Now,

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Speaker 2: when you think about paying twenty five or thirty grand

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Speaker 2: for an elk on a highly exclusive ranch, you probably

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Speaker 2: think that it's just pure bananas and really open to

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Speaker 2: rich oil tycoons or folks who bought five thousand shares

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Speaker 2: of Amazon at its IPO and have held on pretty

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Speaker 2: tightly since. But it's also the people who sell you

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Speaker 2: hunting gear with an aweschus attitude and a curated air

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Speaker 2: of being just like everyone else, but just a little

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Speaker 2: harder working if you get my drift. Now, Look, I

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Speaker 2: don't want to sound like I'm just dunking out a

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Speaker 2: bunch of folks, because I don't mean it that way.

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Speaker 2: Hunting is an industry, and you don't get badass bows

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Speaker 2: and trail cameras and all the stuff we use without

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Speaker 2: the typical trappings of capitalism in its current form. It's

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Speaker 2: just the nature of the game, and honestly, I'm okay

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Speaker 2: with it. I think people should just be able to

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Speaker 2: make a lot of money and start businesses and brands

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Speaker 2: and go for broke. I just think that it sucks

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Speaker 2: a little bit that an image is being sold that you, too,

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Speaker 2: dear listener, can easily have what others have. But just

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Speaker 2: by buying a few things and hunting a certain way,

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Speaker 2: or maybe just working on developing some real grit, you

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Speaker 2: should do all that. It actually will help. But so

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Speaker 2: would an extra two hundred thousand dollars a year. In fact,

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Speaker 2: I bet that would be the busiest way to shoot

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Speaker 2: a bunch of big bucks or bulls. Uh, because it

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Speaker 2: is Well, maybe you're thinking, okay, but what about the

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Speaker 2: folks who just worked hard and developed a brand and

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Speaker 2: a following, and now they own some good land and

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Speaker 2: grow huge bucks. What's so bad about that? Nothing? There's

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Speaker 2: absolutely nothing bad about it, I don't think. In fact,

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Speaker 2: I admire people way more who can build and run

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Speaker 2: a business for a long time over people who can

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Speaker 2: kill big bucks. I really do. But you also need

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Speaker 2: to understand that the business part produces those big bucks.

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Speaker 2: Several years ago, I interviewed the male half of a

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Speaker 2: celebrity deer hunting couple, although not the one that probably

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Speaker 2: comes immediately to your mind right now, and he casually

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Speaker 2: mentioned that he planted one hundred acres of food blots

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Speaker 2: that year, one hundred acres of food blots just for deer.

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Speaker 2: Do you have any idea how much land you need

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Speaker 2: to have access to in order to carve out one

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Speaker 2: hundred acres? For a frame of reference, if you stood

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Speaker 2: where you are now and could somehow walk in a

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Speaker 2: perfectly straight line to the east, you would walk two

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Speaker 2: thousand and eighty seven feet before you turn north, where

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Speaker 2: you would walk two thousand and eighty seven feet, and

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Speaker 2: then west the same distance, and finally south. Inside of

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Speaker 2: that is one hundred acres. Now, that power couple, they

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Speaker 2: killed big bucks, and a lot of them. But what

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Speaker 2: do you think the dollar value behind that land and

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Speaker 2: the input costs of those crops and other resourcess. At

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Speaker 2: one point in my career I did a whole bunch

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Speaker 2: of speaking events at sports shows and deer classics. I

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Speaker 2: got paid five hundred dollars a day, which back then

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Speaker 2: meant an awful lot to me, which is why I

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Speaker 2: didn't mind going up on stage after water skiing squirrels

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Speaker 2: and shit like that. One year I spoke at a

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Speaker 2: deer classic where a couple of really well known white

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Speaker 2: tail hunters were the keynote speakers. They got paid twenty

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Speaker 2: five thousand dollars for the weekend, but also got a

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Speaker 2: free booth from which they sold merchandise, and boy, they

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Speaker 2: were moving some shirts and hats. Imagine making something like

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Speaker 2: I don't know, forty or fifty grand for a weekend.

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Speaker 2: You know what that buys you a shitload of land,

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Speaker 2: which is the key ingredient to growing giant deer and

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Speaker 2: shooting them. When you're in the industry, you hear about

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Speaker 2: one hundred thousand dollars Western leases, giant sponsorship deals, and

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Speaker 2: just big money stuff all the time, But none of

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Speaker 2: that really trickles down to the audience because it would

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Speaker 2: absolutely take the shine off the apple. And believe me,

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Speaker 2: I know that I'm a part of this machine and

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Speaker 2: it has always bothered me. I get why so many

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Speaker 2: people are so sick of the hunting industry and why

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Speaker 2: so many folks are just jaded. I think in general,

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Speaker 2: we are at a stage of humanity where we are

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Speaker 2: just inundated with propaganda and just total bullshit all the time.

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Speaker 2: It comes at us from every direction, and most of

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Speaker 2: us create a little bit of it ourselves. If we

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Speaker 2: use social media at all, we all know that, and

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Speaker 2: it's like we're just stuck in the undertow and can't

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Speaker 2: see any reason to try to swim out of it.

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Speaker 2: That sucks. But what I want to say about this,

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Speaker 2: you know, the message I really want to get out

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Speaker 2: on this anyway, is this just got to find your

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Speaker 2: own way, go be happy out there. However, you have

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Speaker 2: to forget what other people kill and what they do,

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Speaker 2: because you know what that big money is in deer

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Speaker 2: that aren't a part of the industry as well. Most

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Speaker 2: of the folks you see who kill big bucks with

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Speaker 2: any consistency have money. Not all of them, mind you,

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Speaker 2: but a hell of a lot of the grip and

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Speaker 2: grins you see are propped up on real money, leases,

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Speaker 2: buying farms, paying for outfitted hunts. It's all predicated on

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Speaker 2: the big spend. And good for those folks. For real,

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Speaker 2: If you have money and that's what you want to

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Speaker 2: spend it on, I don't begrudge anyone that. But if

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Speaker 2: you don't, or spending half a year's college tuition to

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Speaker 2: shoot a deer someone else scouted for you seems like

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Speaker 2: the move of an insane person. There's an easier way,

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Speaker 2: just go hunting. Forget about everyone else. The truth is

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Speaker 2: that whitetail hunting is full of bs, and we all

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Speaker 2: do it. We all want everyone to know we are,

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Speaker 2: you know, hunting the hardest deer. And the only reason

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Speaker 2: we killed that one hundred and twenty and eight pointer

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Speaker 2: when we should kill one sixties is because the family

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Speaker 2: needed us more and it just felt right in a moment.

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Speaker 2: And we really don't care about trophies anymore. We really

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Speaker 2: want to know, you know, we could kill a giant,

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Speaker 2: we just don't or whatever, and on and on. But

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Speaker 2: it doesn't matter, my friends. Deer hunting is something that

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Speaker 2: should be between us and the deer, you know, mostly

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Speaker 2: you know, maybe us the deer, our families, and maybe

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Speaker 2: some close friends. I kind of look at this stuff,

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Speaker 2: you know, like it has just gotten harder and harder

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Speaker 2: to keep parts of it all secret, and that the

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Speaker 2: money has gotten bigger and bigger because there's more competition

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Speaker 2: for eyeballs and earballs, and every brand out there is

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Speaker 2: looking to attach itself to the folks who can you know,

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Speaker 2: get their products in front of all those eyes or

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Speaker 2: Whisper Sweet, nothing's into all those ears. There is a

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Speaker 2: machine built around making money off of hunting just like

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Speaker 2: there is around literally every facet of our lives. It

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Speaker 2: influences behavior, it promises success, and it directly funds the

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Speaker 2: death of an awful lot of giant bucks. It's just

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Speaker 2: the way it kind of goes. So if you're disgusted

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Speaker 2: by it, or indifferent or all of it, that's great.

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Speaker 2: Follow your own compass, find your own way, and do

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Speaker 2: what you have to in order to enjoy your time

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Speaker 2: in the woods. Because even though that money issue can

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Speaker 2: be an ugly part that sells a lot of folks

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Speaker 2: who want to believe it's also the reason we can

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Speaker 2: sit comfortably in a box lind with our kids on

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Speaker 2: a Sunday afternoon, or slip into the public land on

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Speaker 2: a Tuesday morning and hang us set super quietly, and

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Speaker 2: just about any tree we choose. Everything is nuanced and muddy.

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Speaker 2: And the only thing I really want to give you

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Speaker 2: out of this is that if you're bummed about your hunting,

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Speaker 2: or in that phase where you just can't level up

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Speaker 2: to a good one when it seems like everyone else has,

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Speaker 2: or you're just not enjoying it for whatever reason, it's

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Speaker 2: not hopeless. You're playing by a different set of rules.

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Speaker 2: All of which make the whole thing a hell of

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Speaker 2: a lot more difficult. I recently had a conversation with

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Speaker 2: someone who is trying to kill a doe on public

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Speaker 2: land in Kansas, and it's not owing very well. But

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Speaker 2: this person has been on or around bucks in every

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Speaker 2: hang and bang sit, and I was like, you can't

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Speaker 2: do much better than walking in, reading signs, setting up,

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Speaker 2: and having deer around you. You know, the goal was

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Speaker 2: to put a dough in the freezer, but that's not

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Speaker 2: the only thing that matters. I told this person, like,

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Speaker 2: you're doing a good job with your hunting circumstances and

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Speaker 2: you're stacking up wins. You know that you're not even

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Speaker 2: considering all of us, or at least most of us,

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Speaker 2: are also probably in a position with hunting that someone

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Speaker 2: else would kill two have think about that when you

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Speaker 2: head out. You know, sure, you might not get paid

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Speaker 2: six times the average salary in the US just to

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Speaker 2: pedal a certain brand of bo but if you have

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Speaker 2: enough gear and enough time to go hunting, and you

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Speaker 2: can fill up the truck without worrying about putting food

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Speaker 2: on the table, it could be a hell of a

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Speaker 2: lot worse. You know what, I honestly don't even really

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Speaker 2: know how to wrap this one up, but I've been

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Speaker 2: thinking about it all fall, after hearing some stories about

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Speaker 2: the industry and talking to people who are truly befuddled

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Speaker 2: by white They can't kill a big buck. Sometimes you

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Speaker 2: just want to get something off your chest, you know.

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Speaker 2: I'll throw out a little rant and then go back

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Speaker 2: to the woods and try to figure out where the

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Speaker 2: deer have gone to, which is what I'm going to

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Speaker 2: do this week. And I feel like you should too now,

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Speaker 2: even if you aren't guaranteed to have a booner walk out,

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Speaker 2: because you're slugging it out on public land with a

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Speaker 2: bunch of other hunters who might never get to set

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Speaker 2: foot on candyland even once, let alone own hundreds or

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Speaker 2: thousands of acres of it. So go have fun, remember

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Speaker 2: that everything is total bullshit, and try to enjoy your

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Speaker 2: own deer hunting ride, because if you don't, no matter

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Speaker 2: what your circumstances are, there's some hunter out there who

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Speaker 2: would just kill to have your opportunities. That's it for

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Speaker 2: this week. I'm Tony Peterson. This has been the Wired

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Speaker 2: to Hunt Foundation's podcast, which is brought to you by

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Speaker 2: First Light. As always, I want to thank you so

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Speaker 2: much for listening for all your support. You might have

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Speaker 2: noticed that the days are really short and the nights

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Speaker 2: are really long right now. Maybe you need some new entertainment,

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Speaker 2: Maybe you want to learn something new about hunting. The

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Speaker 2: mediater dot com has you covered. We drop new podcasts,

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Speaker 2: new films, new articles, new recipes, new content literally every

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Speaker 2: single day. Go check it out at the mediator dot

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Speaker 2: com and thanks once again for your support