2023 Omnia Trends

Video Transcription

Top trending baits we saw in 2023. So obviously this was the year where forward-facing sonar showed its dominance over the bass fishing scene anyway. We saw that happen the years before and crappie fishing this year really took over in bass fishing. It's been around for a few years before that yes it has but we didn't see its complete dominance and takeover and see it shifting consumer behavior so much to this year. And we saw that in some bait categories that either were already existed that are starting to get more popular again or just baits built around forward-facing sonar.

So you're seeing jerkbaits which have always been a popular segment but even manufacturers designing their jerkbaits around the idea of forward-facing sonar. So like this one here is the Scope Stick from Bill Lewis. We saw a Rapala guy take down a win with their brand new Mavrick. You're seeing the jerkbait playing what's interesting is not just in the spring. Typically it was a cold water bait in winter months and spring months. That's when the jerkbait was used. We saw the jerkbait play all the way through the entire season this year because anglers are able to stare at their forward-facing sonar screens and see suspended fish and get them to reactivate. Soft plastic jerkbaits are making a major, not that they ever went away, but a big comeback and not being a spring time bank beat and type bait anymore or something like that. They are making their way into offshore presentations with forward-facing sonar. Being fished with heavier weights and them trying to keep them up above fishes heads. So you're seeing things like a Caffeine Shad these big Jerky J's we're seeing bigger soft plastic jerkbaits getting fished around. So you even saw Berkley do this isn't technically a jerkbait but you're looking at the Power Switch here this thing's something you're cracking around the bottom and almost instead of going side to side it's going up and down and twitching around like crazy but it's designed for forward-facing sonar. So you're seeing a soft version of sort of that jerk and pause presentation shining like that.

Hand poured worms. Hand poured worms have been around for a long time. The west coast anglers would kill you for saying that it's just getting popular now. I'm not saying that at all. I'm just saying we're seeing a trend right now where these things are coming on strong. For example this Stike King Filler Worm here. This is a great buy by the way just bang for your buck kind of money in the hand poured worms. We saw this thing struggle when it first came out for our consumers to see it. They were if they were a Roboworm person they always just stayed a Roboworm person. All of a sudden I went to go look to do this video and we were out of a whole bunch of variants of this thing because this style of worm is shining when it comes to finesse fishing with your forward-facing sonar. The king of the hills always been the Roboworm here. You sell a ton of Robworms and you're seeing this getting Neko rig, drop shotted, bunch of different shakey head different ways to rig it. We even saw a new entry into it here from our friends over at Missile Baits with the Magic Worm here which is a collaboration with Roboworm. Saw this thing win a hundred thousand dollars right. This thing has been playing. I saw Brian Schmidt went in with the smaller version of this. This has been a fish catcher ever since we saw this forward-facing sonar technology taken off. It's even amplified the effectiveness of the hand pour.

Lastly you've seen these poop baits coming. I shouldn't say last day I got one more after this but the heavy weighted soft plastics we've seen a big trend in this and I do think that's because we're seeing the way fish are reacting to heavily pressured situations. So you see Yamamoto with their entry, Deps with the Cover Scat here. You got the Bomba from Missile Baits here and you're seeing that you can throw these baits out there without extra rigging weights and all that stuff on your on your bait. Jig heads or anything like that just a hook in them throw them out there and they're sinking and getting fish to react out there.

And lastly we even saw people like Ben Milliken and some of the big glide bait anglers make fish react big time to on forward-facing sonar to big swim baits. So this one this year should be no surprise any of you has been one of the hottest selling baits we have here. This is the Chad Shad from Spro. It's the KGB Chad Chad which is super popular super hard to get. This is a collaboration with them in Spro where they could manufacture them at a higher volume. So these things have been hot as can be. So your big baits too are shining when it comes to forward-facing sonar. I don't look for this trend to end. In fact I think next year you're going to see a lot more baits that are already out there start to shine for forward-facing sonar again and even some new categories as you see the manufacturers adjust to the new school forward-facing sonar world. [Music]