It’s hard to believe it’s been fifteen years since I first sat down to formally agree on terms to supply Robin Red and Haith’s other ingredients to Dynamite Baits.
Dynamite has since become one of the UK’s most respected exporting success stories in the carp fishing bait industry – with exploding sales growth in more than 30 countries and a battalion of anglers to boot who engage with them in more than eleven languages.
Suffice to say, our commercial relationship has stood the test of time and long may it continue.
Dynamite Baits were the first company we allowed to use the Haith’s logo on their packaging. That – believe me – was a tough decision (firsts often are). However, the elephant in the room was that so many of the UK bait firms were including Haith’s ingredients since Rod Hutchinson shared his bait-making ‘secrets’ but often proclaiming their new ‘secret bait’ to be something unique - when we instinctively knew it was in actual fact Robin Red, Nectarblend, Red Factor or Ready Mixed. Dynamite Baits wanted to come clean and say they were using our ingredients and that created trust in the marketplace and we have Dynamite to thank for that.
In fact, it was discussions with Dynamite that encouraged us to protect Robin Red with its unique logo and licence, which makes it easy for anglers to validate which bait includes the ‘red stuff’ because they can follow the chain of custody to our website and see who is an Approved Bait Firm.
In the past 15 years, Dynamite Baits have found numerous ways to extract the most attraction from our ingredients and they’ve used Robin Red to optimise bait effectiveness.
Take, for example, ‘The Source’ boilie range which requires little introduction due to its fanatic following. Dynamite developed The Source with Terry Hearn back in 2002 and say they have ‘never changed or modified the recipe since.’ And I believe them and so must others because I cannot recall ever receiving a query about The Source in terms of its Robin Red content and the additional Haith’s ingredients included in the secret recipe, which is by all accounts super-effective for anglers fishing in the UK and overseas.
What I like most about Dynamite, though, is that they do what they say they’ll do.
What do I mean by that?
I suppose I could boil that statement down to one word and that’s trust.
In the early days, some of the less scrupulous bait firms purported to include Robin Red because they understood they could charge a premium for a bait that included the ‘red stuff’; however, we knew they could only be including Robin Red at very low inclusion rates and that became a simple equation for us to fathom out: how much bait did we guestimate company X was selling versus how much Robin Red was company X buying. In the end, we knew we had to do something because it wasn’t fair to anglers – and (I’m pleased to say) Dynamite Baits were amongst the first to agree minimum inclusion rates with us and nail their flag to the high-quality mast, which is refreshing at an age when chocolate bars are shrinking in size/weight and a packet of crisps is often a packet of air with a few potato chips. And don’t get me started on Wagon Wheels!
This acceptance of inclusion rate was a defining moment in the Haith’s / Dynamite relationship; Dynamite could have solely looked at the bottom line, but they didn’t. They agreed with us – it wasn’t fair to mislead the angler and I’m grateful Dynamite supports our international marketing efforts to help fight the fakes of Robin Red and make it easier for UK and overseas anglers to find baits made with Haith’s bird food ingredients.
I’m pleased to say that the bait firms we deal with today are professional and ethical, and the global elite when it comes to the carp fishing bait industry. In the interest of balance, Dynamite has never attempted any so-called dirty tricks and tried to stop us supplying any of our Approved Robin Red Bait Firms and that’s meant we have equally good relationships now with other companies such as CC Moore, for example.
Two products that continue to worry me are Robin Red liquids and Robin Red pellets: policing the inclusion rates of our materials in these formats is super tough; however, it’s made possible when progressive partners such as Dynamite and CC Moore come clean and share their inclusion rates with us; for example, CC Moore developed their liquid Robin Red offering with a 20% inclusion rate of the ‘red stuff’ and – refreshingly – sent the product to us for testing prior to launch. That’s the kind of relationship we have with the most progressive bait firms.
Happily, Dynamite Baits followed suit by declaring to us the Robin Red inclusion rate for their market-leading Robin Red Carp Pellets and I personally believe they set the pace for any pellet in the market – which is why we’re happy to see the Haith’s logo on pack.
That said I appreciate the necessity of secrecy in the bill of materials and production techniques are sacrosanct (our priority, however, remains the fish and the anglers who decide to purchase bait because it has one, or several, of our ingredients, included. We know from market research that anglers hate wasting time and money fishing with a different product to the one they thought they’d purchased. That’s where our Robin Red strapline came from: Fish with a legend – because time’s too precious to fish with anything else). Dynamite was amongst the first to get behind this campaign:
It’s a progressive relationship that encouraged Dynamite and Terry Hearn to build their giant-catcher, CompleX-T boilie on Haith’s bird food ingredients and Robin Red. CompleX-T is catching monster carp all over the globe:
A monster 92lb (41.8kg) carp has been caught on CompleX-T. Dutch angler Dominik van den Eijkhof banked the huge specimen, known as ‘The Scar’ while carp fishing this week on France’s renowned Rainbow Lake (Lac De Curton).
Here’s to Team Dynamite and the anglers who are counting down the days to spring and summer. We look forward to collaborating for another 15 years, and more.
Tight lines
Simon King
Associate Director – Haith’s
Ps. Anglers reading this perhaps won’t know that Haith’s won the Board of Trade Award in 2018 for exporting and that I’m one of 125 Northern Powerhouse Champions proudly representing the North of England – it’s part of my honorary role to encourage exporting; however, my recent visit to Dynamite Baits reminded me that there are some very progressive companies out there who need no encouragement to enter international markets – Dynamite Baits are one of them, supplying demand for their goods in 30 + countries - #ExportingIsGREAT at Dynamite Baits.
Written by Simon H. King
