Cabela's

I used to enjoy the Cabellas in East Hartford and the Gander Mountain in Middletown NY. Used to get good ammo deals at Cabellas. Used to enjoy their gun Library. Haven't been back since Bass Pro bought them. Both were fun day trips. I have a Bass Pro a short distance from me. Hardly ever go. But my buddy loves it, hits all the sales and gets Bass Pro bucks or whatever he uses to buy guns.
 
Before Basspro bought Cabelas, all Cabelas brand items had a lifetime warranty. For this reason I purchased Cabelas branded fishing poles, fishing bags, and other items.

Shortly after Basspro took over, my $59 Cabelas branded headlamp malfunctioned and when I went in to exchange it, that's when I learned that Basspro had canceled the lifetime warranty on all Cabelas branded items.

I definitely made a large scene. Multiple employees got involved, some of which had a hot temper about the subject, and eventually the store manager got involved. There was lots of yelling... They eventually replaced the headlamp and I no longer spend hundreds of dollars per month there.

This was around the same time Basspro decided to discontinue a lot of necessary fishing items, and replace them with a massive deep sea saltwater fishing selection, in their Wisconsin stores!

These days I only go there when absolutely necessary.
 
I still go to ours in Berlin, Ma. Unfortunately nobody around here can beat their ammo prices.
 
Skeet 028 said:
Went to the local Cabela's(Billings) today. The best that can be said about the visit is Wow...Since Bass Pro bought the company it's sure gone downhill. They had no..none reloading items. Did have a few dies etc..10 dollar Lee shell holders etc. no reloading supplies at all. The only thing I found in there was some 3 inch Herter's 410 shotshells...and they weren't cheap...15 dollars a box. I bought the only three they had...and not even for me. A friend asked me to look out for some 3 inchers over a year ago. I must admit...Scheel's outperforms Cabela's by a large margin. It's sad!
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info, I'm going to be in Billings on the 22nd and planed on stopping there.
 
Pitiful demise of a once fine place to do business, IMHO...

Since my only purchases in the last year has been 2 pair of MOST EXCELLENT Clarks slippers, I, too, am anticipating a different venue for my credit card purchases.

"What's in YOUR wallet?" just ain't cutting it anymore!:(

Cheers!
 
Some one said something about the employees being kinda clueless. I picked up the three boxes of 3 inch 410s no sign about limits. Just to make sure asked the guy at the shooting/gun counter(He seemed lonely. Asked about powder first.Only 2 cans of pyrodex:rolleyes: Then asked about limits on ammo. guy looked in my cart and actually said...wish I had known they were out there..then said limit was 2... I said ok..I'll let my wife buy the 3rd. He was a bit put out. When I checked out the cashier said no limit on ammo. Makes me pretty certain the employees grab hard to find stuff before customers:
 
My family and I use to make the almost 4 hour pilgrimage to the Hamburg (PA) store before they opened the Christiana (DE) store, which became my local haunt since it's perhaps an hour away.

Prior to BP absorbing Cabelas, the Delaware store sponsored my rifle club's Mid-Atlantic Long Range Regional Championship, which draws shooters from the entire east coast and as far west as the Dallas region of Texas. When BP took over, they never extended the courtesy to inform the Club that it was withdrawing it's sponsorship. That, in itself, pretty much ended my visits to Cabela's!

What is truly sad, is that there is a BP 16 miles from home in Atlantic City, and if I'm lucky, I barely walk in there once every 3 years! They refuse to sell HPBT bullets for reloading due to state law on hollow point ammunition, and they built an indoor rifle and pistol range when the store was built that will NEVER BE FIRED IN! Instead, it is an archery test range!

For me, it is worth the extra price to pay for shipping and hazmat fees!
 
We have a Cabela's about 30 minutes from me. I used to go in there a lot. Even bought a few guns from them. Haven't darkened their door in about 2 years. They just don't have anything I need.
 
I'm confused about all the negative comments. In my local store I don't see any difference. IMHO its the pandemic and politics, because nothing seems to have changed since Bass Pro took over.

We can all remember some "issues" in the last 10 years. I won't mention names because I don't want the thread to get closed down.

Anyway, during the last crisis ALL their ammo was sold out and many of the guns were gone as well. But then during the period roughly 2016-2020 the shelves in MY store were full and the prices were reasonable.

Then, in mid 2020, when only "essential" stores were allowed open, there was a run on ammo and guns. The shelves at Cabelas were bare again.

As of right now, they have about 1/3 of the shelves full of ammo, and the gun counters are maybe 50% full.

OTOH, the shoes, clothes, camping, fishing, boats, etc. are the same as they have always been. No change there.

The gun library was always a farce anyway. Only a novice would buy a gun there.

Now Gander Mountain was the place top go. I bought an unfired Pre-27 8 3/8" for $299, and a Pre-14 for $199. That wasn't all that long ago. Their merge with Camping World is what devastated them.
 
I remember when:
Back in the 70s I used to wait with great anticipation for the Cabela's spring catalogue to come in the mail. It was comic book size, in black and white, and on newsprint. Just full of good STUFF. Guess we're not going back. I haven't been to Cabela's store or web site in about two years.
Very sad.
 
I'm holding out for Herters to come back.

I go to Bass Pro primarily for their $9 t-shirts, which they seldom have anymore. I would occasionally grab a pound of powder or a pack of primers I wanted to try (they don't sell by the brick) but now they don't even have shelf space anymore for those items.
 
I agree. Old Johnny Morris must be trying to recoup the money that had to pay Sportsman's Warehouse for backing out of that deal. We have both a Bass Pro and Cabela's in the Phoenix area and they both suck. I'm done trying to find stuff at either one of them. Sportsman's has more stock and better selection.
 
I miss the cabelas branded products with the great (lifetime?) warranty. Cabelas gear was never the lightest or most modern, but I've still got goretex winter gloves and a winter hat from at least a decade ago that I beat on constantly and still hold up. The current store brand offerings are ****, even the wool socks that used to hold up great are trash. A damn shame.
 
You guys don't know how lucky you are to have these big shops. We don't have anything like them in Australia. Only in the past decade we have had a line of franchised national boating, camping, and fishing stores (eg BCF, Anaconda - overpriced or cheap Chinese products - 1/4 the size of your stores). All gun shops in Australia are individually owned along with most other camping and fishing shops. I've been into a couple of Gander Mountain Stores when visiting the US. They just blow me away at how good they are. Maybe things have changed. My last visit was back in 2015.
 
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