As part of his visit to the US in the summer of 2014, a much anticipated visit and guided tour around the Sage rod factory on Washington State's Bainbridge Island was arranged and undertaken. It didn’t disappoint, in fact it completely delighted and inspired. Ian May explains.
After my mid afternoon landing at Seattle’s Tacoma International airport, it was all back to Darrel and Sandra Martins’s for the evening to talk itinerary and plans for the following 16 days of my long awaited trip. This was to include arrangements for the pre-arranged Sage factory trip the following day.
Now, there are a couple of points to raise before proceeding to outline the day itself: firstly a complete bonus discovered during my first evening at the Martin house. Now not wishing to be considered stereotypical, I assumed (wrongly) that all Americans drank coffee! Not so. After being served fine Indian Assam tea from a warmed teapot with water that had to be poured as soon as it had boiled. (a consequence of Darrel’s many visits to England) How splendid! I learned otherwise.
Secondly, I will at this point declare an interest in as much as I am a UK Pro Guide for Sage rods and use them exclusively for my teaching, demonstrating and fishing.
We made the 40 minute drive from the Martin residence in Tacoma which took us north on the area to the West of the Pugit Sound and up towards Bainbridge Island. We were due to meet Sage’s very familiar International Sales Director Marc Bale.
We arrived and were met and greeted by Marc who I have met in the UK on many occasions over the years and who knows me well enough to know that I would be hoping for a very thorough look round, and would probably have a question or two, he did not disappoint!
Part of the initial plan was also to meet another familiar part of team Sage - none other than their rod design supremo Jerry Siem, but regretfully he was called away at short notice and it was all Marc could do was to show us his office and assure us he had tidied it in preparation for our visit!
So from there we went into the R&D department and got an insight into the work that goes into the correct raw materials needed for rod blank design and the relevant properties required to produce the very large and diverse range of rods that are designed and manufactured here. Loved the men at play sign - all of us fly fishing boys can relate to that!
The process of building the rod from blank was explained taking in the taper forming mandrels and the colouring and finishing of each blank moving on to ring wrappings and selection of the appropriate handle and reel seat, an item of great interest to me was the cork handles and the procurement of the highest grade cork from Portugal. Cloth bags and rod tubes are again all produced in a model specific fashion and a considerable amount of this work forms the basis of a thriving local cottage industry.
Rod wrapping department providing the finishing touches to both rod guides and section ends.
The returns and warranty department. Always a busy place with the renowned Sage warranty.
Selected high grade Portugese cork, still the preferred material of choice on all of the high spec rod ranges.
The full range of rod tubes.
In all a fascinating day spent in an environment that just screams of commitment to quality and performance. It's very evident that each aspect of the research, design and manufacture has been given the utmost time and consideration and the people working as part of the team strive to produce a product that is worthy of the Sage brand's hard earned reputation of being amongst the, if not the world's, leading fly rod manufacturer.
Thank you Mr Marc Bale and those colleagues of yours that made my visit as interesting and informative as it indeed was. I now have a very real take on why I love to cast and fish with those rods.
Ian May is an AAPGAI (Masters) instructor and guide based in Hampshire, teaching single and double handed game angling disciplines for trout, salmon & grayling.
He can be contacted at Ian May Fly Fishing www.ianmay-flyfishing.co.uk