I am on a Prostaff with a company not to be named. I received an email from them and confirmed with other team mates they received it as well. Basically the email read this company is cutting 65% of their free (social media marketing) and 75% of their Advertising marketing in the United States. They deleted all their Social Media accounts except Facebook and told the pro staffers and elite pros it is 100% our responsibility to market, promote, and sell (dealers place orders through us) the product for this company. The company is moving all marketing and sales efforts to Europe and Japan. Is this a step into the future? I personally see this tactic failing them with two Elite anglers parting ways in the last month (I do not know if it coincides with one another.) I feel staffers are brought in to drive sales and help get companies into markets they normally couldn't get in not necessarily do all the marketing and sales work.

They're making people who aren't actual employee's take their orders from their vendors? Doesn't sound like a smart idea to me. 

 

If the company wanted to increase my pay such that it equals what they paid for company people to do the things you mention then I would do it, assuming I had the time (probably wouldn't do it if I was fishing for a living). Otherwise, I'd be looking for another job. JMO

59 minutes ago, fishballer06 said:

They're making people who aren't actual employee's take their orders from their vendors? Doesn't sound like a smart idea to me. 

 

Our email had an attached spreadsheet that we are to give to the dealer. once the dealer is ready to place the order we pick it up and scan and email to the sales dept. The sales will collect money and send the order to staffer to deliver to vendor unless the order is too large.

6 minutes ago, Fun4Me said:

If the company wanted to increase my pay such that it equals what they paid for company people to do the things you mention then I would do it, assuming I had the time (probably wouldn't do it if I was fishing for a living). Otherwise, I'd be looking for another job. JMO

I'm sure the Elite guys will be more marketing and promotion and the staffers would be the "sales" people but after reading their email, it makes it sound that we, as staffers, will be worked as employees without employee benefits. This is an across seas company so maybe they are looking to leave the USDM or something. I love the company and products and have been on staff for years just seems like a strange approach to me.

26 minutes ago, Chance_Taker4 said:

 

I'm sure the Elite guys will be more marketing and promotion and the staffers would be the "sales" people but after reading their email, it makes it sound that we, as staffers, will be worked as employees without employee benefits. This is an across seas company so maybe they are looking to leave the USDM or something. I love the company and products and have been on staff for years just seems like a strange approach to me.

 

Sounds odd to me too. Hopefully it will work out and you can be compensated for the extra work.

I don't work for "discounts". 

1 hour ago, Bluebasser86 said:

I don't work for "discounts". 

Agreed. My redfish tournament partner and I often end up talking with other anglers at tournaments and they start talking about sponsorships and pimping stuff out on social media and talking up products, etc. He's a physician and I own a successful business. We both just chuckle and comment that if we took all the time to do that stuff we might not make enough money to fish all of these tournaments. 

This is such a blatantly poor business choice that there must be something else happening behind the scenes.  There are many reasons to run a company into the ground either permanently or temporarily.  It can be advantageous to devalue a company intentionally.  I would suspect that either this company is going to cease to exist or it is going to change significantly if they are truly making an effort to tank all of their U.S. advertising.  

9 hours ago, BigAngus752 said:

This is such a blatantly poor business choice that there must be something else happening behind the scenes.  There are many reasons to run a company into the ground either permanently or temporarily.  It can be advantageous to devalue a company intentionally.  I would suspect that either this company is going to cease to exist or it is going to change significantly if they are truly making an effort to tank all of their U.S. advertising.  

Over the weekend I got some more information sent from my regional sales advisor. The short version is they want to leave the USDM all together but contractual obligations are not allowing them to anytime soon. They are just cutting everything to the United States and considering any US sales as "Extra sales" in their 2018 budget until they can completely leave the market.

45 minutes ago, Chance_Taker4 said:

Over the weekend I got some more information sent from my regional sales advisor. The short version is they want to leave the USDM all together but contractual obligations are not allowing them to anytime soon. They are just cutting everything to the United States and considering any US sales as "Extra sales" in their 2018 budget until they can completely leave the market.

Wow.  Sorry, man.  

That just sounds like a business using any and every remaining staffers who are willing to their advantage. Looking at it from the outside in I don't see any benefits to the staffers for all the hard work they are putting in. My question would be why would a staffer stay? 

A step into the future? Sure. As long as that future involves losing their pro staffers, it sounds like they are seriously taking advantage of that relationship. And I can't say for sure without knowing the brand, but cutting advertising by that much could be cutting their own throats. If it's a well established brand where the customers know them and are willing to seek out what new product lines they are launching then that's one thing, if it's a smaller company then they need to get the word out and have as many people talking about their product as possible. The only exception I can think of is big bait custom manufacturers that many people may have never heard of but they develop enough of a cult following that the demand and available supply from a one or two man operation reaches a nice balance point simply from word of mouth.  

It's an exit plan, look for another sponsor!

Tom

Move on, and fast.

 

You have been told the company is moving out of the US and those plans are in motion.

 

Pro bass fishermen do not have time to sell products on a regular basis.

 

Good luck in picking up another sponsor.

cliffs- RIP orange stix

 

i dont think they will be missed around here

11 hours ago, d-camarena said:

cliffs- RIP orange stix

 

i dont think they will be missed around here

If you are regarding to the company that sponsors me you are wrong.