In a sea of import competition, the very American-made Avet Reels swims apart.
Memorial Day weekend marks the unofficial start of summer. Among the most popular outdoor activities that Americans will engage in during the long holiday weekend is fishing.
And boy, do we fish. Americans purchase approximately 31 million fishing licenses annually, securing fishing’s place high on the list of our nation’s participation sports. That means we purchase a lot of fishing gear, too. And no fishing equipment is arguably more important than the reel.
Most fishing reel companies have moved manufacturing to countries like China, Korea and Japan. This has led to a significant decrease in American-made options.
There is one company, however, that manufactures its entire line of fishing reels in the United States.
Avet Reels, in Chatworth, Calif., has been producing high-quality saltwater reels since 2002. All its rigs are machined and manufactured under one roof there. And, except for some small bearings, which can no longer be found in the U.S., they’re entirely American-made.
“All the screws, springs and washers and stuff like that, are all made here in America,” said Scott Throop, a general manager at Avet Reels. “Every component we machine. We have 30 CNC machines and eight people assembling reels every day.
“For small bearings, there isn’t anybody that makes them, so we are forced to outsource them.”
Avet purchases aluminum for the reels direct from Alcoa and Bralco Metals in Los Angeles. The stainless steel used to make parts for the reel’s interior is also sourced in America.
“All of our aluminum comes in 12-foot-long bars, in various diameters for the reels,” said Throop, who has worked in the fishing reel business for most of his life. “They go through a stock saw that that cuts them into slugs. The machine does all of the turning and milling, and a robot will stamp the completed part at the end of the machine.
“The aluminum goes through multiple machines, all computer controlled (CNC). The main structure and parts are made out of aluminum to keep the weight down and keep the corrosion down.”
Avet Reels is owned by brothers Harry and Sarkis Alajajyan who started a small machine shop after immigrating to the U.S. from Armenia 40 years ago. The brothers are huge fans of offshore saltwater fishing, and Harry was thinking about making a fishing reel even before they purchased their first CNC machine.
“They started the company as a job shop, a regular machine shop that made aerospace parts, mostly for telecommunications,” said Throop. “They were getting their first CNC machine installed on a Friday afternoon and when the technician returned on Monday to finish his work, Harry handed him the very first Avet reel.
“Harry was going to make a reel for himself and some friends, and word got out and the next thing you know he started selling them all over the place. Tackle shops got interested and it just dominoed from there. Now we’ve got distributors and send these things all over the world.”
That is when Avet Industries also became Avet Reels. Today it manufactures about 75 reels per day at its 25,000-square-foot factory in Southern California. The Avet reels are sold through a nationwide network of approximately 500 dealers, from small independent tackle shops to large retailers like Bass Pro Shops and Cabela’s. Avet Reels does not sell its reels online, direct-to-consumer, but some of its dealers will sell Avets on their individual websites.
Avet’s 26 employees make 32 different models of reels, but many can be purchased with different options, increasing the number of SKUs with the variation in colors, sizes, left-hand and right-hand and various other options including the number of gears.
“We don’t do any casting, molding, or foundry work. They are all machined from bar stock,” said the 56-year-old Throop. “Everything is 100% carved out of metal. All of the aluminum stuff is hand polished.
“Right now, we do eight different colors to choose for every model, and we make 1,450 UPC numbers for reels. That is a lot. We have single speed reels, two-speed and now three-speed.
“If you get a big, heavy fish that is hard to crank in with high gear, you just downshift to a low gear just like downshifting a bicycle going up a hill. It gives you more cranking torque to reel the fish in.
“We’ve added a third gear to some of our reels because low gear is sometimes just too low especially with fast fish like marlin, sailfish and wahoo.”
The different models of Avet Reels are tailored to the type of fishing you want to do. Big game fishing requires a larger reel, and smaller reels are often used by anglers fishing from piers, the shoreline or in a harbor.
“You can’t discount the surf fishermen, the guys who fish in the harbors and the guys who fish on a kayak, which is big now in California,” said Throop. “The pier fishermen have been a great market for us. It’s not just the charter boats. The shore fishermen really buy a lot of our stuff; the smaller reels.”
Avet Reels are also used in freshwater fishing when anglers are chasing huge catfish or are trolling Lake Michigan for huge lake trout and trophy-size muskie. These freshwater fishermen are not a target for Avet sales, but the lightweight aluminum reels do the job just like they operate in saltwater.
Aluminum is the perfect metal for fishing reels since most fishermen prefer a light reel. Avet’s smallest reel is 13.5 ounces while its biggest, the TRX 130, weighs in at 80 ounces.
It manufactures a single speed reel with no option that sells for $203. For those out on open waters chasing a marlin or sailfish, the giant three-speed TRX 130 sells for $1,500.
“After 9/11, Avet comes along, the economy is in the tank and Harry and Sarkis decided that we will compete with the import reels that are coming in but make them here in the United States,” said Throop. “We are still toe-to-toe with Daiwa, Shimano, and Okuma. We rely on volume to make our money.
“We like to consider ourselves as an example that Americans can compete with these other overseas reels, overseas products.” To learn more about Avet Reels and to find a dealer visit the company website at www.avetreels.com.