We recently connected with Darrell Kenny and have shared our conversation below.

Darrell, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Looking back, do you think you started your business at the right time? Do you wish you had started sooner or later

I don’t think I would have started my business sooner , but I would have loved to have gotten into the craft sooner I find myself trying to learn everything I can about it and I just wish I would have been able to start making lures sooner just to have that much more experience and knowledge. I’ve been making soft plastic fishing lures for going on 6 years and have been a business for almost 5. We spent a few years watching and learning about the craft before we bought the needed equipment to start.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

Hi, I’m Darrell, I own and operate Stillwater Bait Co. in Trotwood Ohio. We are a family-owned small batch custom soft plastic fishing lure company. We are a web-based company that does custom lures as well as keeping a fully stocked website of traditional and not so traditional soft plastic fishing lures. We use only dead on Plastix plastisol and Epic Bait Molds. As well as using Alpha pigments for a lot of our colors. We have over 70 molds in our library as well as a full color Library. I have always been into the outdoors and fishing. I got into other things as a teenager but thanks to two of my closest friends I got back into fishing in my early 30’s. My wife also likes to fish and we would go often before we were married after a while we started talking about making our own crappie bait just to save money and be able to do our own colorways. After a few years of watching videos and learning about bait making and making sure it was something we really wanted to make the initial investment on we bought some dead on Plastics plastisol and they do it 3.5 “Ripper mold. You’re very quickly realized that we like to make baits very much it was very creative and fun we had a great time doing it. I was documenting all of this on my social media accounts and very quickly I had people asking if they were for sale. I told people no for a handful of months and then when I felt like I was making dates that were worth selling I started telling people yes. After a few months of that I realized it was starting to take off and it was something I wanted to do at least as a side Hustle so I Incorporated it as an LLC and did all the necessary legal things to make it a legitimate business and then started listing things on my Instagram and made a website stillwaterbateco.com. shortly after that the company that me and my wife worked for was sold while my wife got another job I decided to take Stillwater full time and make it my career. With the help and support of my family it’s something that I have put my everything into. As far as what we do and what kind of brand and Company we’re trying to to build. While we do do very out of the box colorways I don’t really list those I reserved them more for bonuses and extras. I want to be known for having Dependable affordable soft plastic lures that catch fish. We do traditional colorways with a little twist we also do very non-traditional colorways. But we just want to be known as a brand that cares about the customer, and makes a product that is worth the time and money that they put into us. I like to direct people to our Instagram account because a lot of stuff that doesn’t get posted for sale gets showcased there and it gives people an idea of our style and our Vibe and kind of a reference for if they wanted to make a custom order what kind of lures they’re going to get.

What’s been the best source of new clients for you?

The best source of new clients for me has really been social media. We try to post 3 to 5 times to 4 or 5 social media accounts per day, as well as making the occasional YouTube video. But I also do things that bring me new clients in my specific industry like when I go fishing I will leave bags of Samplers with a sticker that has the website and the Instagram handle. As well as talking with local bait and tackle shops and even leaving flyers on message boards at grocery stores.

How’d you think through whether to sell directly on your own site or through a platform like Amazon, Etsy, Cratejoy, etc.

Right now we have a fully stocked website stillwaterbaitco.com as well as a little side store on eBay. Some of the cons of not being on a lot of different sales platforms are you Miss customers and visibility. But I think one of the pros is at least for me is it allows me to have a little bit of exclusivity. While I want to be well known I don’t exactly want to be, what is the word maybe name brand I feel like a lot of what makes us us is that it’s all handmade we may use the same techniques but everyday it’s a little bit different because they’re all poured or injected by hand there’s no machines there’s no mass production and I think that is important you know you’re getting a product that somebody put their hands on their time they’re sweat and I think that matters at the end of the day at least to some people.

Contact Info:

• Website: stillwaterbaitco.com
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/stillwaterbaitco?igshid=MzNlNGNkZWQ4Mg==
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DYTangler?mibextid=ZbWKwL
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darrell-kenny-645084206
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/Stillwaterbaits?t=nsnGYw4sd7cZ72VI4MUOQg&s=09
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@stillwaterbaitco9008

Image Credits
Darrell Kenny, Lisa Kenny