How Much Is Too Much?
Recently I watched a video where a fisherman had recently moved to a new state and went fishing for his first time there. He was shocked at the price to launch his kayak at the boat ramp but paid the $17 anyway because he had driven a couple hours to get there already and he loves to fish. This got me thinking. At what point would it be too much for me to want to pay just to launch my boat? First off, this is all theoretical for me since I don’t own a boat or even a kayak. However, $17 does seem steep to me for launching a kayak. I don’t mind paying more for higher quality service or products, but in my experience boat ramps are usually seriously neglected and sometimes outright dangerous. It would have to be a really nice launching area for me to drop a Jackson in the box. If I had no other choice, then I guess I’d have to fish less, at least from a boat at that location.
Then I got to thinking about other things like license fees, registrations, equipment, gas, lures, etc…How much would it take to piss me off vs. make me quit fishing? I’m already a cheapskate, so it wouldn’t take much to piss me off, but I’m not sure how much it would take for me to stop fishing altogether. Currently, being military in Florida, I get a pretty good deal on my fishing license each year. I pay around $20 and get pretty much every license, tag, or stamp that Florida offers for both salt and fresh waters, along with hunting. I don’t really fish saltwater very often and have never hunted here, so I wouldn’t care too much about those particular ones, but if freshwater fees increased to let’s say $100 I’d be super pissed but I’m not sure I’d necessarily quit legally fishing. If you made freshwater license $200, then I’m pretty sure I’m done. Again, If quality is through the roof, it wouldn’t be as bad, but still that is pretty steep. With what I’ve seen so far here in my part of Florida, the waterways are always full of trash and out of control chemical spraying is destroying a lot of the fishing areas. So, if Florida changed the price overnight for freshwater licenses to $200 a year, I’d probably quit.
As I said before I don’t currently have a boat. I don’t even have a tow vehicle (truck). Both are way overpriced right now, since COVID and YouTube made everybody Professional fisherman this past year. So guess who still won’t have a truck or boat anytime soon? This Guy! Not unless I can find a recently cheated on or divorced wife willing to separate with his truck and boat. I’ll also take someone’s truck or boat to help get them through their midlife crisis. I might even get lucky and save Mr. Noballs that neglected to ask his wife first before he bought them. Haha. If you know of any of these people, please send them my way. Either way, I’m probably waiting until gas is $3 a gallon again.
All joking aside, I’ve found that there are very few things that I use for fishing that can’t be replaced by something cheaper of similar quality. I’ve caught fish on $20 lures and 20 cent lures too. Sure, some things look or feel nicer, but for the most part the cheap stuff catches fish just as well. One thing that’s for sure is that the bass don’t know how much you spent! Some items I’m willing to spend more on would be mainly for safety. I’m partial to certain higher cost items sometimes if there is a design difference that can’t be found cheaper. I’ll pay as little as I can for most plastic baits, but I’m generally willing to spend a little bit more for specific wire or hard baits. If I could have it my way, no lure or package of plastics would cost more than $5. That seems like a good round number that is fair, especially considering where most fishing items are made and how much of a markup they sell for. A new boat with a new motor shouldn’t be more than $30k. To me, spending $100K on a bass boat is just plain stupid and pending more than $30K is dumb unless you are a legit professional guide or a pro on a top level tournament tour like the B.A.S.S. Elites.
What do you think? Am I just a cheapskate or do you think prices are getting out of hand? What is your breaking point? What item(s) are you willing to pay a premium price for? Let me know in a comment below. Thanks for reading.
Published
Originally published at http://l2-fish.com on January 29, 2021.
