This goes along with the Mag Touch Post - Looks like the new Cabela's catalog has split grip rods all over. Both their private label, and some of the independant companys. What next?

They tend to follow the custom rod building trends. Rich Forhan was doing all this a half dozen or more years ago.


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Just proves their vendors read Rod Maker Mag.

Each "new" thing is how they sell more rods to the "gotta have" crowd - because it's different, because it's what their buddy got, and so on. It almost doesn't make any difference if there's a true purpose for it.

But it kind of shows we're doing something right, eh?

Uncle Russ
Calico Creek Rods

Went to my local "pro shop" today to look at rods and get some thread color ideas......They are now selling the Okuma line of "kayak" rods and quite a number of split grip and no fore grip designs from a variety of tackle manufacturers and I like to see where they are taking the "new" ideas.

Derek L. McMaster
Rohnert Park, CA

Born to Fish, FORCED to Work

Most of the major commercial rod manufacturers do in fact subscribe to RodMaker. Early on I didn't understand this, but I caught on pretty quickly.

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Berkley Series One rods were the first commercial rods to use split grip handles on their rods and that was probably close to 20 years ago.

Now that you mention it, I remember owning three of those rods back then in the late 80's and early 90's. They had black EVA handles and sold for somewhere around 80.00. They were one of the most popular bass rods around at that time. Also after the spiderwire craze hit , Spiderwire came out with a split grip casting and spinning rod marketed for the use of their line.

I have the old Berkley catalog. They offered what we'd now call a split grip only on a few of their longer bass rods, not the shorter ones. They also used single foot fly type guides on nearly all the Series One Casting Rods. I spoke with Tom Bedell about this at the time and know where they got the idea - from the custom rod building market.

He also told me then that by adding 25 cents to the figured cost of each Berkley rod, they could afford to replace 20,000 rods per year at no charge to the customers and without incurring any expense to Berkley. The first year, he said that they had only had to replace 12,000 rods so he felt they were actually making money on the deal. But only through the quantity they sold were they able to do this.

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I had a Shimano rod about 30 years ago that had a split grip.

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

if ya'll are talking about the new cabela's spring master catalog, i don't see any split grips!

As most all of us older guys know, surf rods have had these style grips for decades. They have appeared only sporadically on other rod types until very recently, when most of the major commercial rod operations all now offer some type of split grip and/or no foregrip bass and similar style freshwater rods.

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Not for nothing, up until a couple of years ago...all the "slick" rodbuilders poking fun at the commercial rod industry were making rods with solid butt grips & foregrips. So before you sit here and make jokes, take a look in the mirror. Just because you build a rod, doesnt mean the idea of a split grip is yours. Just because you read an article on split grips, then copied it, that doesnt' make you any different than the commercial rodbuilders.

In additional to surf rods having split grips, Cod Rods have employed split grips for quite some time.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/08/2008 12:32PM by Billy Vivona.

That's very true - once the idea is out there it's not only commercial rod makers that may pick up on it, or vice versa.

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Which reminds me of a cousin that I used to have that did all of his fishing with a "Mexican spinning rig", line tied around a beer can, line slung out with his right hand, and line went out such as from a spinning reel. For a while those rigs were being sold at tackle stores. One day my cousin was fishing from the shore and was catching a mess of Gafftop catfish with his rig. Next to him were a few fishermen with all kinds of fishing rods and not catching anything. One guy commented, "Look at that guy catching all of the fish with a beer can and here we are with all of the fancy stuff and not catching any fish".

Like Billy, I find it kind of amusing that every time a manufacturer comes out with a new type of seat/grip, etc., the same custom builders that knock the manufacturer's start asking where to get those grips!!! We all copy (I definately do!)

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

Something else that many people don't realize, is that over the past few years Rich Forhan has visited many if not most of the major rod manufacturers in the U.S. and shared his many concepts and ideas with them. Much of what you see that follows his revolver rod concept was not stolen or copied - it was freely and gladly given to them with nothing expected in return. Just as Rich did this for the custom builders in his articles, he did the same to many of the commercial rod makers as well.

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Tom saying the rod manufacturers are copying "us", or that they are watching closely to what the rodbuilding "community" is doing - is kind of silly since that is exactly what the custom rodbuilding community and us are doing - looking at what one or two people are doing, then putting it on their rods too. SAme exact thing as the rod MAnu's.

I think people are just upset since they know that some of the things they've been trying to sell to fishermen are no longer selling points and they know that the custom rod market probably just shrunk a whole lot. Considering that some factory rods use components we cannot use (reel seats & butt caps), and are outfitted with fairly decent quality guides, and thy are on the same blanks, and now they have split grips are are much lighter...LOL at this one....the only thing custom rodbuilders will be able to offer differen than a factory rod will be....get ready - threadwork. LOL, I make myself laugh sometimes.

The commercial rod makers do indeed watch the custom rod market - if not, I see no need for them to be taking RodMaker Magazine. What would they be doing with it - many of the people in those companies don't even fish, let alone build rods outside of the manufacturing process they're involved in. Berkley has 4 copies sent to their offices. Surely the secretaries there aren't closet custom rod builders. Then again, perhaps they are.

I do agree that custom builders are just as likely to imitate, copy, etc., what they see and read just as the commercial makers do - but the commercial makers have a bigger stake in bringing out the next "thing" that might get them a larger market share. They certainly do their own thinking but you'd better believe they keep a close eye on what the custom rod market has going on. Anything that might be a hit on the sales floor is something they're going to be interested in.

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This is really nothing new in the field of rod making if you go back when Berkley had the Series One rod it was a split grip and I was building rods before that with a split grip. It all depends on the customer and also the trend like anything else in this world look at clothing styles the old is coming back in style again?


Neal Cissel
Neal's Fishing Products