The Coshocton County Beacon November 5, 2020 | Page 18

18 • The Beacon November 5 , 2020

Passion for deer hunting leads to business venture

By Josie Sellers
Gary Fischer has a passion for deer hunting , and he enjoys sharing it with others through his Booner Ridge Deer Feed company .
“ I went public with the feed in January 2018 after family and friends encouraged me to ,” Fischer said . “ I originally developed it for my personal use and had no intention of going public .”
Fischer started working on his recipe because he couldn ’ t find a commercial feed on the market to use year round that
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had the right nutritional combination of vitamins and minerals he wanted .
“ I got to a place where I wanted to hunt smarter not harder ,” Fischer said . “ Instead of just feeding them corn , which has very little nutritional value , I wanted to give them something that would help them grow big .”
Through different connections Fischer had in the deer-hunting community , he was able to compare feeds and discover what he was missing .
“ I worked with Gerber

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Since taking his product public , Fischer has gotten lots of positive feedback from customers .
“ The cool thing for me is to see customers notice a difference when they start feeding deer my feed ,” Fischer said . “ Like any other livestock , you are what you eat . It ’ s not that we don ’ t have great deer and genetics in Coshocton County , but you can always improve on that . I decided years ago that instead of looking and looking for that one great deer , I ’ d improve what I had out there and make them healthier and bigger . We are consistently hearing that deer on our feed are being field dressed at over 200 pounds . I ’ ve gotten pictures where the deer look like beef cattle hanging there .”
Quality feed also can impact a deer ’ s rack .
“ Nutrition goes to the deer ’ s body first , and any excess nutrition and protein goes to antler development ,” Fischer said .
Analyses of Booner Ridge Deer Feed can be found on Fischer ’ s website , along with pictures of deer that have enjoyed his product .
“ It kind of went crazy with just advertising on social media ,” Fischer said . “ I have six retail locations and serve 16
Submitted
Gary Fischer is pictured with his wife Michelle and the 11-point buck she shot this year .
counties in East Central Ohio . We are all the way down to Marietta , as far west as Jackson and up as far as Mogadore . We have customers in Michigan , Pennsylvania and West Virginia that all own or lease land in Ohio .”
On his Booner Ridge Facebook page , Fischer shared that the Ohio Department of Natural Resources said during the 2019-20 deer harvest season that Coshocton was number one and the next six counties were adjoining . He also has read on ODNR ’ s website that more than 40,000 out-of-state hunters come to Ohio to hunt .
The economic benefits of deer hunting are huge .
“ I ’ ve read that for Ohio it ’ s more than $ 850 million ,” Fischer said . “ Amy at the chamber has told me she averages 10 calls per week about deer hunting here , and that ’ s weeks prior to the season starting . We are an epicenter for deer hunting and always have been .”
Fischer tries to make his product affordable for deer hunters . The average price of Booner Ridge Deer Feed is $ 17 for a 50-pound bag . According to Fischer , anything on the market comparable to it in nutritional value would cost about $ 24 a bag .
“ Going into this , I wanted to make it affordable so people could use it and see the benefits ,” Fischer said . “ I don ’ t try to make a lot of money off of each bag , and the retailers aren ’ t going to make a lot of money off of each bag . My philosophy is we can make a little bit of money off of a lot of sales instead . I want it to be affordable so people can use it year round .”
Local retailers for Booner Ridge Deer Feed include Friendly Meadows Country Store in Walhonding , The Power Shop in West Lafayette and Russell ’ s Hardware in Warsaw . Cox ’ s Lawn and Vegetation in Conesville also will soon be carrying the product .
“ Doing this is fun ,” Fischer said . “ Deer hunting has been my passion all my life . I ’ m always excited when I get pictures , emails and texts from customers who have noticed differences in their deers ’ health and how much bigger they are . I ’ ve learned a lot just through my own years of deer hunting , and I love talking to people about it . I ’ ve made a lot of new friends through this that I wouldn ’ t have met before .”
More on Booner Ridge Deer Feed can be found online at www . boonerridge . com .
“ We ’ ve grown to almost the point where we might have to find someone else to help us ,” Fischer said . “ We are averaging almost 20-30 tons of sales per month . It just keeps expanding .”