I recently received an invite to go for a cup of tea. I love tea, (and biscuits!) so I travelled up to Sheffield to meet new tackle shop owner Mark Oakes at his ‘Nitro Baits’ emporium.
For more than ten years, Mark Oakes has been designing and producing his own diverse range of baits and additives after becoming fed up with available products which promised the earth, but which didn’t deliver….Designing and researching baits is an expensive and time consuming process; Mark spent many long hours ensuring that his offerings worked before thinking about setting up in business. Prior to making the decision to give up a full time job to pursue his dream, a chance meeting on the bank with a writer from a highly respected weekly angling publication convinced Mark he had baits worth marketing. The reason? After scratching for bites all day, the journalist had caught nothing; noticing that Mark had been consistantly catching while others struggled, he asked for the remains of the sucessful bait when Mark went home. The result was a nationwide hunt for the mystery benefactor!
The result was a front page article which featured ‘Nitro Baits’. During the session, over 90lbs of fish were landed for the camera, and Mark subsequently landed 735lbs of double figure carp in just 6 hours! A record which still stands on the venue all these years later!! Now convinced the venture would work, the result was a factory unit manufacturing baits on a bigger scale. 10 years later, a shop became the natural evolution to allow Mark to develop, refine and perfect the baits to make the most of the huge demand which followed.
The range of ‘Nitro Baits’ now includes boilies, groundbait and method mixes, pellets, particles, sprays, glugs, dips and all manner of other goodies which have a proven track record. Alongside these, product displays from Nash, Waterline, Kryston and other major companies dominate the tidy but well stocked shelves. The shop is a ‘proper’ independent outlet, full of treasures and secrets which can be found in amongst hanging nets, bedchairs, brollies and all the other kit that the angler likes to browse around. There is none of the high pressure sales pitch, and you are free to wander in peace, but the offer of friendly advice and a mug of tea if you stay a while is too good to miss and results in a steady flow of new and returning customers.
I noticed that Mark particularly valued the younger customers and made the effort to ensure that they got the correct tackle for the fishing they were interested in and were then shown how to get the best from it; a far cry from the ‘money at all costs’ ethos of many bigger stores. Whilst I was there, many anglers came in and purchased maggots; nothing special in that, but how many times have you visited a shop and been left with a tub of grubby wrigglers that are flecked with the debris from storage and dead maggots that will never catch a fish? I use the state of bait sold as a good indicator of a shop, and the ones I saw were clean, healthy, riddled in store and active;- just what you need! It’s not just another carp store either; catering for everything from pole to pinkie, feeder to leader, Mark has something for everyone.
Nitro Baits have many exciting new items in development including revolutionary colour changing baits which react with water to give something new for the fish to fathom, and a range of other particles flavoured with stunning new scents to trap wary targets.
Currently running an amazing competition on the shop website (www.nitrobaits.co.uk), Mark has 6 months of free bait and Nitro Baits clothing up for grabs in two categories; biggest fish caught using Nitro Baits, and largest haul on the baits. It runs for 12 months until March 2011, so make sure you get your reports in to be in with a chance of a top quality prize! Nitro Baits will also be sponsoring ‘Angler’s Corner’ in local publication ‘The Mercury’, a Sheffield based newspaper. With £25 worth of Nitro Baits on offer each month to the best catch picture from an angler under 16 years old, Mark is keen to see younger anglers submit pictures of ANY species of fish caught on ANY baits to encourage participation in the UK’s biggest pastime. Read ‘The Mercury’ to get 30p off a pint of maggots when you visit the shop.
If you want to find out more about Nitro Baits, visit www.nitrobaits.co.uk call 01143278864, or pop in to the shop at 5a Southey Hill, Parson Cross, Sheffield, South Yorkshire, S58BA; you might even get a biscuit with your tea!
Mark and his dog!
