# Great to see customer service is still alive



## TheCream (Mar 19, 2009)

I feel obligated to share this story in several places, to share that there is a company in the industry that went the extra mile for me. A few weeks back, I was looking hard for a 1wt line to replace my current line. What I wanted was a higher visibility line. It doesn't matter where I am, a WV gin-clear creek, the Hocking River, a lake or a pond, I cannot see the olive green line in the water. It drives me nuts. I can't fish a subsurface pattern for panfish without an indicator because I can't see the line. Even when fishing in WV, trying to watch for currents catching my line and causing drag, I struggled to see the fly line in the water. The catch is, practically all fly lines in 1wt size are olive...or willow...or sage...basically all the same. In my research, I found a Canadian company I wasn't familiar with that (at least at one time) produced a mint green 1wt line. I emailed the company, Northern Sport, and inquired about the availability of the 1wt line. The response was quick, and suggested they stopped making that line due to production cost and low demand, but the guy said he would check to see if they had any of those lines laying around anywhere. Having not heard back, I assumed he came up empty handed. Then, yesterday, I got a letter in the mail. 










I noticed immediately this letter was "fat." I opened it up, and sure enough, enclosed were two fly lines and a hand-written note from the man I had been in email contact with last week. The note said he found these two lines, a 2wt orange line and the 1wt mint green line, and sent them to me in hopes they would work for me. I was pretty blown away by this.










As luck would have it, I had located and ordered the 1wt line from a supplier I found online in NY not long after the emails with Northern Sport. It was on closeout for only $15. I had just field tested that line for the first time over the weekend. The Northern Sport Aqua Nova line actually blew me away and performed better than the much more expensive Cortland line ever performed for me. And more importantly, I can see it in the water with ease. So now I am set with a great line for the 1wt and a backup for that line when I eventually wear it out.


----------



## zimmerj (Oct 17, 2014)

Often the smaller companies have the best customer service. They have to separate themselves from the biggies. Now the chances are good that you will contact Northern Sport again in the future. Just what they want and deserve.


----------



## All Eyes (Jul 28, 2004)

zimmerj said:


> Often the smaller companies have the best customer service. They have to separate themselves from the biggies. Now the chances are good that you will contact Northern Sport again in the future. Just what they want and deserve.


Exactly. You won't get that kind of service from high volume companies for a couple of reasons. First, they are always short handed on help and run with just enough people to get orders out, and they are blowing stock out the door with or without your small order business. What gets me sometimes are the Ma and Paw outfits who have a big store attitude as dust is collecting on their merchandise. 
Still though, this particular merchant The Northern Sport obviously went above and beyond just good customer service and it was nice to hear the story. I have a very similar experience with the Sea Dog company that produces the marine switch panels that I bought while doing a boat restore project. Their customer service rep blew me away by todays standards of what's expected. They are strictly wholesale but you wouldn't have known it by how they went out of their way to e-mail me several times and locate 2 switch panels. Then they sent them to me at wholesale cost. Anyone else would have given me the name of the nearest retailer and gone on to the next call. I think most times it comes down to the individual you are dealing with. Some people are just genuinely nice and helpful. Unfortunately most are not. Thanks for helping to restore some faith in humanity, and the heads up for what sounds like a great place to do future business.


----------



## Shortdrift (Apr 5, 2004)

Not too many companies and personnel like that around anymore. Thanks for sharing.


----------



## sherman51 (Apr 12, 2011)

thanks for your story its a good one.

a couple of yrs ago I contacted egos2slider.com about getting there 23x27 net and the 48x108 handle. I was told the 23x27 net only came with the 39x69 handle because of weight limits with the longer handle. but I went on to explain I would retract the handle before lifting a big fish. its just to hard to fit a 28" to 32" walleye into a 19x23 net. so he agreed to ship the larger net with the longer handle but it would void my warranty on the handle. we talked back and forth a while then I got him to custom make me a 27x33 net without warranty. so I asked him to go ahead and make me 2. it took awhile to get them but he shipped them for 59.00 each plus 10.00 for shipping, and I couldn't be happier.


----------



## ducman491 (Oct 31, 2011)

That's great I'll look them up for lines. I've been wanting to upgrade the cheap Cabelas line that came on my 3, 5, & 8 wt combos.


----------

