EP 553. Tom Beckbe Updates

Ramsey Russell: Welcome back to Mojo’s Duck Season Somewhere podcast, where today am in the booth with Rackliff Minja, my buddy from Tom Beckby. Rackliffe, how the heck are you?

Rackliff Minja: I’m good, Ramsey. How are you?

Ramsey Russell: Man, It’s been a big year for Tom Beckby this year.

Rackliff Minja: We had one or two things going on.

Ramsey Russell: Did you have one or two things going on?

Rackliff Minja: Yeah, a couple things. Trying to remember the last time I saw you. We were in Baton Rouge for the Delta Waterfowl Convention.

Ramsey Russell: That’s right.

Rackliff Minja: So that was all the way back. Was that July or August?

Ramsey Russell: July, month of August.

Rackliff Minja: Yeah. Since then, we launched the Mossy Oak collaboration, which was wildly successful and a whole lot of fun. And then we opened two new stores.

Ramsey Russell: Two new stores. That’s what I was getting at. I mean, I was scratching West Virginia off my list, staying in Front Royal, Virginia, right across the state line. And all them boys up there told me, they said, man, you gotta come see the new Tom Beckby store. It’s badass. I go, where’s that? It’s right there. And that’s your old stomping grounds.

Rackliff Minja: Old stomping grounds, yeah. I grew up in Winchester, Virginia, which is just north of Front Royal, right there at the northern end of the Shenandoah Valley. It’s the point at the top of Virginia. And we opened a store in Middleburg, which is on the eastern side of the Blue Ridge. It’s called Middleburg because it’s the midpoint between Winchester and Alexandria. It’s an old stagecoach town, dates back a long, long time. It’s really the heart of, you know what they call Virginia hunt country.

Ramsey Russell: Everything there dates back a long, long time.

Rackliff Minja: A long, long time. As you and I have talked about, the stores have been such a huge part of the story of Tom Beckby, dating back to when we had a small store in Wilson, Arkansas, which we opened in 2019, and then our Birmingham store, which we opened in 2021. The stores for us are one of the most important things we do because it allows for this kind of interaction that you and I are having right now, face-to-face, in person, talking about product, trips, friends, hunting, fishing, all those great things. We opened a new store in Oxford, Mississippi, in the fall of 2023, which was really an eye-opener for us. The model that we developed in Birmingham resonated with people who share similar cultural interests, values, passion, in places like Oxford. We had circled Middleburg as one of those places in the U.S. where people spend a lot of time outside. They’re passionate about the outdoors, and the outdoors are a central part of their way of life. We were able to find a really cool old building, the second oldest building in Middleburg, dates back to the 1820s, right at the one stoplight in the middle of town, across the street from the historic Red Fox Inn, which has been there since the mid-1700s. It’s just been a great experience to meet our customers up there, to meet new folks. Gives me an excuse to go back to town or back to Virginia. We’ve got two great people running the store, one of whom married an old friend of mine from high school, and the other is an old friend from high school.

Ramsey Russell: Wow.

Rackliff Minja: Yeah. It’s just been an awesome, awesome experience.

Ramsey Russell: What was it like growing up in Middleburg, Virginia? And how does the Tom Beckby lifestyle reflect your upbringings? I know it does. It’s got to.

Rackliff Minja: Yeah. Well, be really clear. I grew up on the other side of the mountain from Middleburg in Winchester. Middleburg folks will be very quick to tell you that I grew up on the other side of the,

Ramsey Russell: You’re wrong side of the hollow.

“What’s unique about Middleburg and that part of Virginia, there’s been a lot of growth and development in Virginia, but the folks in that part of the world are very passionate about protecting their rural way of life. Conserving the land, which doesn’t mean putting it in a glass box and not touching it. It means using the land in the way that the land has been used for hundreds of years.”

Rackliff Minja: Yeah, exactly. And vice versa. There’s something about what we do at Tom Beckby focusing on what people might call country life, people who spend a lot of time outdoors, people who have a strong connection to the land. What’s unique about Middleburg and that part of Virginia, there’s been a lot of growth and development in Virginia, but the folks in that part of the world are very passionate about protecting their rural way of life. Conserving the land, which doesn’t mean putting it in a glass box and not touching it. It means using the land in the way that the land has been used for hundreds of years.

Ramsey Russell: That’s right.

Rackliff Minja: So that’s everything from agriculture to raising horses and riding. Fox hunting is a huge part of the culture in that part of Virginia, and so our traditional hunting and fishing. Wing shooting, big part of the lifestyle there. If you think about the similarities between a Tom Beckby customer, or just the folks we hope are Tom Beckby customers, whether that’s Birmingham, Oxford, Mississippi, or Tuscaloosa, where we open another store this fall, or Middleburg. The through line in all that is a passion for being outside and a connection to the land. Obviously, we’re based in Alabama, and I think people sometimes think of us as a Southern brand or Southern-focused brand. But that connection to land and passion for the outdoors is deeply ingrained in the American psyche. It’s not unique for Alabama or Mississippi or even for Virginia. Our customers all the way up the I-95 corridor, out in California, in the upper Midwest, and Canada all have that same part of their DNA, which is a real strong connection to the outdoors. Even if they don’t spend a ton of time outside, people naturally and intuitively understand what it’s all about.

Ramsey Russell: And how does your product line address that fundamental nature of outsideness?

Rackliff Minja: That’s the customer for us. That’s the person we think about the most, people who enjoy spending a lot of time outside. What we try to do is think about all new product development, production, in-store experience, and all the different touchpoints of Tom Beckby focused on someone who has a passion for the outdoors and gets that piece of the culture. There’s a ton of people that lead busy lives, and so their opportunities to spend time outside are few and far between. What I hope is that when they get those opportunities, we’re delivering a product that’s functional, useful, but that they can also transition back into their everyday so they can take a little piece of that passion into the office or out on the weekend, even if they’re not in a blind or riding a horse or whatever it is.

Ramsey Russell: It’s very timeless. The lifestyle you all evoke is a timeless quality I think. The product, the look, the feeling, the function, it’s been around forever, and you all continue to progress it into the modern era.

Rackliff Minja: There’s something, it’s timeless for a reason. Some things go in and out of style. I think part of the timeless nature of what we produce, which is traditional sporting apparel, our outerwear line is anchored around wax cotton products, wax canvas outerwear, canvas and leather bags, cotton shirting. That’s the core of what we do. We do some more modern stuff around that to complement it. But that’s the center of focus for us from a product standpoint, and all that’s very traditional and dates back a very long time. I know you just got back from a great trip in England, which I want to hear about.

Ramsey Russell: Unbelievable.

Rackliff Minja: I’d love to hear where you went and who you saw. I saw a lot of great photos and video. It looked like there were a lot of guys who were dressed like the British version of a Tom Beckby guy.

Ramsey Russell: They were. You know, one thing I noticed midway through the trip, it was an eight-day run and gun. We covered 1,500 square miles in England and Wales. It was just an amazing trip of just see it all, see as much as I could in eight days, and leave me patting at the curb, getting on the plane. But you know the first thing I asked when they invited me over there, I’m like, do I have to bring a tie? Do I have to wear those short, long pants?

Rackliff Minja: You don’t strike me as a tie and plus-fours guy.

“But I noticed that throughout the day, after we had been through the briars and been through the bracken and been through the stuff in the mud and come back, we’re standing around tailgating, they’re taking note of my gear. And they started asking me a lot of questions about Tom Beckby. Where is this? What is this?”

Ramsey Russell: No. And he said, no, no, you don’t have to do that. But I did go hunting on a very illustrious driven woodcock hunt. And it was wild woodcocks. And they would send 15 or 20 beaters, and their three or four dogs apiece. A lot of little tiny cocker spaniels that get up under the bushes, and here they come, if you’re in the right spot. And oftentimes I was. And when I got to that particular event, they were wearing the plus fours and the wool blazers and the ties. And I got me a little topper. I liked that wool tweed topper. They got as warm, but I felt a little out of place. But I knew, I had on my wax cotton pants, my Tom Beckby jacket. I had everything, my layers for that weather, which was damp, sometimes raining and windy. And I was comfortable as I could be. Those Tom Beckby shooting gloves, I love those leather shooting gloves. And I felt a little conspicuous walking out to the field with them, because they looked a proper English gentleman. But I noticed that throughout the day, after we had been through the briars and been through the bracken and been through the stuff in the mud and come back, we’re standing around tailgating, they’re taking note of my gear. And they started asking me a lot of questions about Tom Beckby. Where is this? What is this? They wanted to know all about it. Then when we went midway through, went to some of the stores, had to go to a hunt store to look for some stuff. It really did. A lot of the shirtings, as you call a lot of the product, really did remind me of Tom Beckby. You know what am saying? It’s been what they wear forever. You all ain’t got the plus fours. I’m just saying everything else, the wax cotton, man, that’s a big, huge thing. If you’re hunting in a damp, windy environment, that wax cotton’s perfect.

Rackliff Minja: Yeah, it’s great. And it’s funny, England and the larger UK, Scotland in particular, where we manufacture all of our wax canvas, is the traditional home for the product. Its origins date back to sailcloth being treated for weatherproofing and durability. It’s a great product that lasts a long time for a very simple reason, which is the wax, in addition to protecting you, protects the fabric.

Ramsey Russell: That’s right.

Rackliff Minja: And it keeps the fibers of the cotton moist but also protects them from abrasion and from becoming brittle and ultimately breaking and tearing. If you properly maintain a wax garment, it essentially will last indefinitely, which, going back to the lifetime enduring quality of it, is part of the reason that the products we make, and folks who work with wax cotton, the products have that enduring appeal, because the product itself is literally lasting a long time. When you purchase one of these things, it’s a bit of a cliché in marketing to say you’re making an investment, but truly the case here. If you maintain it, care for it, you can wear it forever. I mean, how many days of the year do you think you wear a Tom Beckby Chatham jacket in the field?

Ramsey Russell: Well, I mean, you see this one I wear the most. Two hundred days maybe, and it looks it. I told somebody the other day, man, they were oohing. And I go, yeah, you can’t buy that. You can only earn this the old-fashioned way, you got to wear it.

Rackliff Minja: You got to wear it. The thing that’s interesting about wax canvas and wax cotton products. Let’s talk modern tech and modern speak, the performance attributes of properly manufactured wax cotton fabric. And when I say properly, I mean carefully chosen fiber. Just like producing any other fine product, you want long staple cotton. Our wax canvas jackets are all made with U.S. cotton. It’s a better cotton itself. The longer staples allow you to weave a finer thread. The finer thread allows you to get a denser fabric. Denser fabric allows it to be a couple of things, it’s softer, easier wearing, and it is more durable. It also takes up colour better, so you get a richer, more vibrant colour in all of our fabrics. I mean, just look at the Mossy Oak Bottomland that we print on this fabric.

Ramsey Russell: Unbelievable.

Rackliff Minja: I mean, not to toot our own horn, but I think that’s about as good as Bottomland has ever looked. And that starts with the quality of the fabric, and then that flows into the quality of the dye that’s being used and the people who are dyeing it for you. And then the final step, and the most important one, is not all wax is created equal. There are a lot of wax products on the market, and they all have different performance attributes. The same way that modern waterproof gear has different attributes, whether that’s a Gore-Tex or someone else. They’ve all got a different rating to them. And the key ingredient in wax canvas performing better is a higher grade of wax. So when you touch a Tom Beckby jacket or pick up one of our bags, one of the first things that people notice is that it doesn’t have an odor. It doesn’t have an odor because it’s a higher grade of components going into the wax, which produces a better-performing wax. And it doesn’t have that oily feel or sheen. Same thing. It’s the same way that you cook better food, you put better ingredients in it. So that’s a bit of the science behind what we do with our partners at Halley Stevensons in Scotland to produce the fabric. Then putting on your hat and saying, all right, that’s great and all, but how does it actually perform? You wear it 200-plus days a year. You would have to be in a pretty extreme environment that would require you to wear something that’s 100% waterproof, and few products are 100% waterproof. I will put the performance attributes of our wax canvas up against modern technology in 95% of the scenarios and for almost 100% of your average sportsman.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. It’ll surprise you how it repels. And I layer up, but I wear it a lot. I wear it all the time. I wear that jacket between 65 to 70 degrees Fahrenheit. I wore it outside this morning, it felt like 12. So, I mean, I just layer accordingly underneath there. And I’ll tell you something, you didn’t mentioned it, it’s the silence. You start getting around these synthetic products, even a deaf guy like me can hear the Velcro, or hear the scratch, hear a twig rippling plastic 100 yards away. And I know if I can hear it, the wildlife can hear it. I can’t stand it. I go to the woods for kind of a silence and a solace, and I think that just sounds so unnatural to hear that plastic crinkling out there. You don’t get that with this wax cotton.

Rackliff Minja: Yeah, I’d say the other thing too about natural fabrics is that, look at them in low UV. So that’s early in the morning and late in the afternoon. Does that sound like a time that a hunter might want to be in a blind somewhere? The natural fibers do not provide that kind of low UV glow that you get sometimes in a synthetic. Again, we believe that we’re delivering a product that truly performs. These have been around for a long time for a reason. People have been wearing and using this fabric for a long time. And if it didn’t work, it wouldn’t still be here.

Ramsey Russell: Run down your product line just real quick, at least your men’s coats, that’s mostly who’s listening. And then I’ll let you talk about my wife’s jacket she got for Christmas. She loves it. But you started with the Tensaw jacket, and I wear the Chatham. Talk about the steps in between, like the one you’re wearing right now. I know that’s a very popular model you’re wearing.

Rackliff Minja: Yeah, I’ve got on a Shallowford jacket. So I think the way to think about our jackets is length, and then the length somewhat feeds into the fabric that we use on them, and then whether or not they’re insulated so, very, very quick tour, if we were doing this in a store, I could do it with all the jackets in front of us, but this is the way I would run a customer through it. The Tensaw is the original jacket that we made when we started the business back in 2015. Ten years of Tom Beckby this year, and it’s now available in, let me make sure I’ve got all the colors right, six colors. That’s three different camo patterns, two traditional ones, Mossy Oak Bottomland, and then I don’t think I have all the colors right. Let’s see. Trying to count them all. Might be seven now.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah.

Rackliff Minja: And then you go down in total length. So the jacket gets a little bit shorter, but it gets heavier. An insulated jacket we make is called the Fowler, and that comes in too. It’s essentially a waterfowler’s jacket. It’s quilted with HD wool. The reason we use wool insulation is, one, we thought natural fiber with natural fiber. So wax canvas exterior with a wool interior. HD wool is a super cool product for all the reasons that wool is cool. It keeps you warm when it’s wet. It helps thermoregulate, so if you’re throwing decoys out, it’ll help you release your heat. And then when you sit back down in a blind, normally there’s that moment where you just put out a big spread and you’re a little sweaty underneath your jacket, well, that ain’t gonna happen in a Fowler coat. All that moisture is coming out. And then when you sit down and stop moving, which is traditionally when I get the absolute coldest, that’s because I’m trying to get rid of all this sweat, and now I’m sitting here waiting for the sun to come up, the coldest part of the day, the Fowler jacket helps you regulate. And it’s got a great removable hood. Three colors, Mossy Oak Bottomland, Rye Brown, and our Wheat color, which is really for our upper Midwest guys. And then we make that same length jacket in what I’m wearing, the Shallowford, which is a mid-length wading jacket, essentially.

Ramsey Russell: That’s what it is, yeah.

Rackliff Minja: Yep. And then we get shorter still in the jacket you wear. So the shortest, trimmest jacket we make for men is the Chatham jacket. We would call it like a ranch-style jacket or, it’s got a little bit of a western look to it. But it’s a waist-length coat made out of shelter cloth, 8¼ ounces. And it’s got the red clay liner on the inside like all of our jackets do. Just a great durable jacket, as you can attest to.

Ramsey Russell: But people ask me all the time which jacket I wear. And normally when they ask me that, I’m wearing that Chatham jacket. But I gotta clarify, I’ve also got the Tensaw because it’s longer, it’s got a zipper. I wear it outside my waders. The reason that Chatham gets the most wear is because it reminds me of an old Levi Garrett denim trucker’s jacket. Fits. And I can wear it under my waders, over my layers, under my waders, boom. When it’s raining, you don’t want to wear your jacket under your waders.

Rackliff Minja: Right.
Ramsey Russell: So then breaks out the Tensaw with the zipper that goes over everything. Over my waders.
Rackliff Minja: Yep.
Ramsey Russell: And that’s how I stay dry.
Rackliff Minja: The important thing about the Chatham too, like all of our jackets, is they’re made to be functional. And so the Chatham has all the features in it that a Tensaw has, bi-swings, gussets, all those things, so you’ve got mobility. So I think, sometimes people think trucker jacket and think they can be a little restrictive in the shoulders and the chest. I mean, you’re shooting in a Chatham.
Ramsey Russell: You’re right about that. You’re right. It’s got a lot more movement than a tight-fitting, but it fits good enough to stuff up under my waders great. But it’s not the only jacket I wear. And my kids all love this jacket you’re wearing right here, this Shallowford. That’s one I’m seeing a lot of folks starting to wear. It’s got to be one of your top products.
Rackliff Minja: We started with the Tensaw jacket. Now we’ve got a jacket for every guy, every scenario. We’ve got different lengths, different insulation, different thermal properties, and different colors. So there really isn’t a scenario, whether that’s use or place that we don’t have covered in our outerwear collection. The two jackets I forgot to cover are the Piedmont, which is a lighter-weight version, six-ounce coat versus eight-and-a-quarter-ounce of the Tensaw. It’s got a fold-down collar. Still a great outdoor jacket. Very functional in the field, but a little easier wearing every day. And then on the insulated side, people love that Fowler jacket a lot. That’s a bulletproof hunting coat. If you want an insulated wax jacket that can be worn more easily, casual, we introduced the Patek jacket and vest this year. It’s got a lighter-weight canvas on the outside, great HD wool insulation on the inside. Super warm jacket. Like today, cold here in Atlanta, some bad weather in the forecast tonight, that’s a great jacket for knocking around Atlanta or doing something casual in the outdoors. That’d be the one to go to.
Ramsey Russell: Yep. Talk about your women’s product line real quick.
Rackliff Minja: We’ve got a wax jacket for women, it’s the Blakely. It’s got all the great utility functions that all of our men’s jackets do. We make a cool wax vest for ladies too, called the Fairmont. A couple of layering pieces and a couple of shirts for them. Great shooting shirt. I think 70% were employees are ladies. So internally and driven by customer demand, we’re spending a lot of time thinking about how we can grow that collection and do something that’s really for women who have the same interest in the outdoors and provide a broader and better product offering.
Ramsey Russell: We were down in Argentina last year on a hosted couples trip, and one of the ladies stepped out to go to town wearing one of you all’s jackets, a form-fit and kind of quilted, insulated coat. All the women fell in love. My wife got one for Christmas. Loves it. It’s a knockout. And it fits them. She can’t wear my coat. She can wear that coat. It fits her. I think it’s a great line to grow. Are you getting a lot of demand for female stuff?
Rackliff Minja: We’re getting a lot of demand for female stuff.
Ramsey Russell: They’re part of lifestyle too.
Rackliff Minja: Yeah, it’s a big part of the lifestyle. I’ll tell you where it’s been the most surprising, the outdoor culture among women is super strong in Middleburg. You’ve got a lot of ladies who ride and who shoot up there. It’s been an eye-opener for us. One, it’s a lot colder up there than it is in Birmingham.
Ramsey Russell: You better believe it.
Rackliff Minja: And the second thing is there’s just a great culture of ladies in the outdoors. Going back to what we were talking about at the top of the podcast, that’s one of the great things about having a store. Those ladies can come in and look around and say, “I love all this, but there needs to be more in here for me.” Having that conversation directly with the customer, face to face, and hearing what they need and what they’re going to use it for informs where the brand goes. We don’t just come up with new products in a vacuum. We’re trying to make what our customers want. Talking to people directly removes the guesswork.
Ramsey Russell: Right.
Rackliff Minja: And it also gives people buy-in. Like you and I were talking before we started recording, about this feature, that feature, this way, this color. That is the stuff that is the most important to what we do as a brand.
Ramsey Russell: Excellent. Did you sell out of Mossy Oak?
Rackliff Minja: We tried.
Ramsey Russell: You surprised me at Delta Waterfowl Expo when I rounded the curb and saw all that Mossy Oak. Buddy, I’m going to tell you right now, Mississippi boy talking here, Mossy Oak never looked better than it looked on you all’s jacket. It was smoking.
Rackliff Minja: Thank you. Mossy Oak came out of the gates hot, and there was a period of time where we were selling it faster than we could make it. I think we’ve caught up now. More to come from the Mossy Oak story from us this year, both in terms of new products and maybe a new Mossy Oak pattern getting added to the assortment. You grew up in Mississippi, and my family connections are in Alabama. The Mossy Oak story began on the banks of the Tombigbee River. The original Mossy Oak tree is down in Choctaw Bluff, Alabama. That culture that bred Mossy Oak is the same one I grew up in, hunting and fishing. My grandfather hunted down there. If we were wearing camo growing up, it was always Mossy Oak, and it was always Bottomland. It’s been an exciting thing for me to come full circle and print Mossy Oak on the products we’ve created. As folks know, the Tom Beckby name itself is the old French name for the Tombigbee River. When we opened the store in Tuscaloosa this past fall, if you’re from that part of the world, it makes more sense from a geographical and ecosystem standpoint than I think it does if you’re looking at it from the outside. If you look at it from the outside, we opened a store in a great university town, close to the University of Alabama. The town itself is big. We’ve done a great job of connecting with the student body, meeting parents visiting, and all that is true. But the other thing to remember is the Black Warrior River flows through Tuscaloosa down into the Tombigbee River. That whole ecosystem on the western side of Alabama and the eastern side of Mississippi is one giant ecosystem that goes all the way down to the Gulf Coast. It includes West Point, Mississippi, where Mossy Oak is based, essentially on the other side of it. That’s a wild, big, vast place. A lot of the great sporting tradition in Alabama and Mississippi is centered around it. The store in Tuscaloosa is a way to meet that customer, him or her, where they are. It touches on my personal history and a lot of other folks’. Just like the Middleburg store has been great for the Virginia connection and getting back up there and then same way the Tuscaloosa store has been great too. I can’t tell you how many people we’ve gotten from all over the state of Alabama. You and I talked about this when we opened the store in Oxford. As I told you, we didn’t open a store in Oxford, we opened a store in Mississippi. I feel the exact same way about the store in Tuscaloosa because, in a calendar year, most people in Alabama, particularly if the Iron Bowl is in Tuscaloosa like it was this year, whether you’re an Auburn fan or an Alabama fan, you’re going to end up in Tuscaloosa at some point. It’s been a lot of fun to have that.

Ramsey Russell: Where next?

Rackliff Minja: Where next? I mean, that’s a great question.

Ramsey Russell: I know you’re thinking about it. Can’t say yet.

Rackliff Minja: Can’t say yet. Always thinking about it. The big story for us is the store in Birmingham was kind of a lark in 2021 when we opened it, just coming out of COVID, not sure how it was.

Ramsey Russell: Heck of a lark.

Rackliff Minja: Heck of a lark. Product offering was a lot smaller. That store is going to get twice as big this year. So, at least the store, the space next to us. That’s a big undertaking for us. But we thought, it’s the 10-year anniversary of Tom Beckbe. What better way to reinvest in Birmingham and in that store than opening it up and making it a little bit bigger? Excited to do that. I’d say the biggest thing on the agenda for 2025 is our new partnership with Ducks Unlimited.

Ramsey Russell: I was just fixing to ask you. Can you talk about some of that product? Tell me about this product partnership.

“If the focus of our brand is a core sporting customer and people who are passionate about the outdoors, we have to be involved with and supporting conservation. It’s the right thing to do at a personal level. If we’re supporting hunting, then we need to support the resource. What better organization to partner with than Ducks Unlimited?”

Rackliff Minja: I can talk about the partnership in a larger sense, and then we can talk more specifically about the product. If the focus of our brand is a core sporting customer and people who are passionate about the outdoors, we have to be involved with and supporting conservation.

Ramsey Russell: Absolutely.

Rackliff Minja: It’s the right thing to do at a personal level. If we’re supporting hunting, then we need to support the resource. What better organization to partner with than Ducks Unlimited?

Ramsey Russell: That’s right. It’s all about the habitat.

Rackliff Minja: All about the habitat. The quality of folks at Ducks Unlimited, we’re excited to work with them. The work they’re doing is national in scope, international in scope, across the border in Canada and Mexico, all the way up and down all four flyways, is really impressive, how ducks Unlimited can leverage a huge volunteer network, truly a grassroots organization, to impact the quality of habitat on a local level for the benefit of everyone on an international level. We’ve got a multi-year deal with Ducks Unlimited that we signed last fall. The arrangement is for us to produce an exclusive Ducks Unlimited line of products, all premium, all within the Tom Beckbe universe of traditional, better outdoor gear. A portion of the sales of all those products will go directly to Ducks Unlimited to support wetland conservation.

Ramsey Russell: Amen. That’s kind of a big deal these days, especially on the heels of a duck season like we just finished, by the time this airs. Man, we’re losing habitat left and right. I circle back and think about the UK. One of the first people I interviewed was a biologist who talked about how the entirety of the United Kingdom has been touched by man. There’s no wild habitat anymore. It’s all artificial. And if it weren’t for groups like Ducks Unlimited, we wouldn’t have it at all. I just feel so blessed. I feel like, on one hand, we’re losing it. We have to fight tooth and nail for it, but we’ve got Ducks Unlimited helping us. Where would we be without it? We’d probably be right there where England is. That’s a scary thought, Radcliffe.

Rackliff Minja: That is a scary thought. Like you said, it all comes back to the habitat. Let’s take it to the most basic level, the ducks have got to have somewhere to live, somewhere to reproduce, and somewhere that’s free from human interference to do that.

Ramsey Russell: That’s right.

Rackliff Minja: If you’re going to be an outdoor brand and you’re focused on the sportsman, then you’ve got to put your money where your mouth is and support conservation. So that’s what we’re doing.

Ramsey Russell: How are you all collaborating with Ducks Unlimited?

Rackliff Minja: It’s starting to become an open secret because we’ve been photographing and filming some of the product all winter long. We’ve designed a unique jacket for Ducks Unlimited.

Ramsey Russell: It’s beautiful.

Rackliff Minja: Thank you.

Ramsey Russell: I started drooling when you laid it on with the coat. Yeah.

Rackliff Minja: Ramsey’s seen it, no pictures allowed. What’s important about that jacket are a couple of things. One is it incorporates a lot of feedback we’ve gotten from folks like you, from waterfowlers, about what they’d like if we were going to build a new jacket from the ground up. The other thing that’s cool is DU is getting their own color from us. It’ll be a unique color in our outerwear line. Probably the coolest piece of the whole deal is that we designed that jacket for men and women. It’s the exact same jacket with all the same features. The only difference is the women’s jacket is cut to fit women in a utilitarian, functionally outdoor way, not restricted, but still looks good. Obviously, we flipped the placket so it’s on the right side for ladies, but that’s it. It was important for us, and really important for DU. So many of their volunteers and employees are women, and in the waterfowling universe, the amount of products that are utilitarian but not dumbed down, for real ladies who spend time in the outdoors, are few and far between. So we’re super excited about that.

Ramsey Russell: That’s good. Racket with all this you’ve got going on, do you have a chance to duck hunt anymore?

Rackliff Minja: I do. The DU thing has been a great excuse. It’s been an excuse to go duck hunting and claim that we’re doing marketing. The easier thing for me to do with business and with family, I’ve got two young kids at home, is to go for a week at a time. So I spent a week in Arkansas right when the second split came in, at the beginning of December. I know it’s been a tough season for a lot of folks. The hunting was good that week. We were lucky enough to join some old friends of the brand on some flooded green timber hunts, which were just sort of the iconic Arkansas experience. And then I just got back Monday night late. I’d been in Oklahoma hunting this past weekend, where we went from, I think, 68 degrees on Saturday to 25 when we woke up on Sunday morning.

Ramsey Russell: Fun, fun.

Rackliff Minja: So it was a lot of fun. We caught the front end of that cold front.

Ramsey Russell: Push any ducks down?

Rackliff Minja: It pushed some ducks down. The guys we were hunting with hunt in southern Oklahoma. I won’t say where. They had their initial push of ducks that migrated early, and just because of the way the weather’s worked out this winter, hadn’t really seen another big wave of ducks come through. But it was pretty obvious that by midday Sunday, we were seeing a new wave of ducks coming through. And the hunting was great. What’s fun about the DU project and the marketing we’re doing behind it, I’m actually going to Maryland next week to hunt on the Eastern Shore, do that kind of traditional hunt there. Mallards, black ducks, canvasbacks.

Ramsey Russell: That’s gonna be righteous.

Rackliff Minja: It’s gonna be righteous, and it’s gonna be cold there too. What’s fun about the DU project is, one, it’s allowed us to talk about waterfowl across three different flyways, and we’ll cover more of the flyways for next year’s marketing. To do something that I think you do better than anybody, which is to talk about the universality of the experience, the tradition, the passion all across a bunch of different places. You travel more than anybody in the waterfowl universe. I’d love to hear you say, what do you think is the common thread that ties everybody?

Ramsey Russell: People. We’re all out there doing what we want to do. These guys may have one thing in mind because it’s a very subjective sport. It’s the camaraderie and the people. It’s just being out and outdoors. I can’t articulate it any better than that. That’s the universal thread, people connected to nature, wanting to interact with nature and conserve nature so they can interact with it later. I see that worldwide. It’s just people.

Rackliff Minja: Yeah, and that’s the truth for a guy who’s wearing plus-fours in England or a guy who’s wearing Mossy Oak in Mississippi.

Ramsey Russell: Unbelievable. It’s all the same. Or a guy aspiring to wear anything. It’s all the absolute same. It’s just duck hunters, and they’re outside, and we’re really pretty simple, uncomplicated people, at least while we’re in the blind. We just want to be comfortable and with people we care about. Hunting wild birds. It’s all the same.

Rackliff Minja: What do you think the magic of the duck is? Why do you think it’s so enchanting?

“Man, I have wondered that a million times. To me, the aura of duck hunting, and coming from a guy that shot them all kinds of ways, but it’s that moment when they come around that last pass and they lock wings and they’re coming in.”

Ramsey Russell: Man, I have wondered that a million times. To me, the aura of duck hunting, and coming from a guy that shot them all kinds of ways, but it’s that moment when they come around that last pass and they lock wings and they’re coming in. It’s that spellbinding moment because we’re communicating. Whether I’m an aggressive caller, not calling much, got the decoys out, he’s responding to my little 40-yard, 40-meter sphere of the world. When he locks up and they’re coming in, to the point sometimes I shoot them on the water because I forget to shoot them when they’re coming in. I’m just so spellbound after all those times, after all the ducks I’ve seen doing it. There’s that breath-holding moment when they lock up, and they’re still too far, and they’re coming in, and you’re just holding your breath and watching it. I just love that, man.

Rackliff Minja: Do you think that some of the, and not to get too philosophical on duck hunting, but for me, I feel like you and I’ve talked about this before. My original passion for hunting was turkey hunting. What I loved about it was, people talk about how hard it is. What’s hard about turkey hunting is that it’s not canned. The turkey is wild.

Ramsey Russell: That’s right.

Rackliff Minja: I didn’t grow up duck hunting, but as I got older and got into it, for me, what’s so attractive, what keeps me coming back, is that the duck has agency. They’re wild and free and they travel a long way and I think that moment when they’re coming into your spread, and you know they’re coming in, is the distillation of all those emotions, knowing how far they’ve travelled and that they don’t have to be in front of you.

Ramsey Russell: They could be anywhere. But the relationship of us all being there and doing that, and that magic, that aura, is contagious among all humanity worldwide that are sitting in a duck blind. There’s just something. I can’t say that about anything else. About deer, about turkeys, it’s not the same. But waterfowl, universally, you feel that everywhere you go, that energy. I love it. Man, I freaking love it. Radcliffe, I always enjoy having these conversations with you. I really do. We keep talking about the UK, and it’s been a tough season in North America this year. Now here we are setting up for Dallas Safari Club. For the last 15 years, the boys at camp have asked me, when is Dallas Safari Club? The reason they ask me that is historically, you could just about have good odds on this, that polar vortex is going to hit when Ramsey leaves for Dallas Safari Club. And it’s hitting outside right now. So I’m sure we’re going to see a lot of duck hunting pictures while we’re here. A lot of ducks moving to the Deep South. But you know one of the most interesting things about going to the United Kingdom, they don’t have bag limits. They don’t have bag limits, and yet nobody’s motivated by bird numbers. That was the most perplexing thing to learn and going over there. There’s no bag limit. What’s the limit on mallards? There is none. What’s the limit on geese? There is none. But they all stop. I was goose hunting with some folks, and I said, why are we stopping at four? They said, well, because two braces of geese is plenty. And it really was.

Rackliff Minja: I think what you’re talking about is hugely important, particularly after the duck season we’ve had this year. I had an experience this weekend, we were hunting and shooting, and we had a lot of mallards and pintails working. We were being very mindful, because we were having such a good shoot, of staying within, keeping count of how many ducks we were shooting. At one point someone said, where are we? What’s the count? And the comment in the blind was, I’m not sure, but that’s enough.

Ramsey Russell: Yep.

Rackliff Minja: And then we just sat back and watched the show.

“You go to a country with no bag limits, and it’s not at all about the trigger pull. They go out and shoot birds. Some days are better than others, and they go back and do it again. They can sit out there 24/7 if they want to, and they don’t. Just a different approach. I like that.”

Ramsey Russell: That’s it. It’s all about the show. That whole aura of duck hunting really doesn’t have a dang thing to do with the trigger pull. You go to a country with no bag limits, and it’s not at all about the trigger pull. They go out and shoot birds. Some days are better than others, and they go back and do it again. They can sit out there 24/7 if they want to, and they don’t. Just a different approach. I like that.

Rackliff Minja: I think most people I talk to, if the weather, whatever reason you want to cite for having a slower duck season than everybody wanted to have nationally, it’s a universal thing. We’ve travelled a good bit this season, and you’ve travelled a lot more. Talking to people, universally, seems like it’s been a slower season. A lot of speculation about what’s going on. But I think part of the conversation has got to be, am I getting enough out of the resource? It may not matter what I can take.

Ramsey Russell: Yeah. You said it earlier, we can’t just take, we gotta give. All of us have to give, good years and bad. We gotta give back to the resource or it’s not gonna be there.

Rackliff Minja: That’s right.

Ramsey Russell: Radcliffe, I appreciate you, buddy. I always enjoy seeing where you all are going and doing. You all haven’t been around forever, but you all are growing leaps and bounds. I really see that a lot of the hunting and sporting world is embracing this lifestyle you all are putting out there, because you all’s company keeps growing,

Rackliff Minja: Thank you.

Ramsey Russell: Growing and growing and going and going.

Rackliff Minja: We’re trying.

Ramsey Russell: Anyway, tell everybody how they can connect with you.

Rackliff Minja: Come by and visit us at tombeckbe.com, T-O-M-B-E-C-K-B-E dot com. Come visit us in any one of our four stores, Birmingham, Oxford, Mississippi, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Middlebury, Virginia. We’ve got almost 200 retail partners across the U.S. There’s a list of them on our website. If you click into the Community bar at the top on navigation, there’s a list of stores you can get to. These are really great folks we partner with on a retail level. A lot of them are independent retailers. These are mom-and-pop shops. They’re great outfitters, great destinations, and really good people to know. So if you want to touch a product, try it on, and you’re not near any of our four stores, please go visit these folks. They’re investing in our business by carrying Tom Beckby products, and we are proud to work with them.

Ramsey Russell: Thank you. Folks, thank you all for listening to this episode of Mojo’s Duck Season Somewhere podcast. You’ve been listening to my buddy Radcliffe Minj, Tom Beckby product. Go get you some. Go try it on. If you haven’t got it, I bet most of you all listening do have it. Go try it on. See you next time.