Sage is not moving. Based on Bainbridge Island, Washington, Sage manufactures all of its fly rods right there and plans to continue doing so. Seems like some recent scuttlebutt over the company possibly moving is now quashed. “I don’t ever see us leaving Bainbridge,” said Sage’s president, Travis Campbell. “At the end of the day, I think we can make a better product here.” Another reason he cites: “[T]o protect our intellectual property. If we took (Sage) to China, everybody would very quickly know our magic. Here, we can keep our secrets.”
As I wrote a few weeks ago, the fly fishing industry manufactures its stuff mostly right here in the USA, especially the high and mid level gear, but even a lot of the lower priced quality stuff is done domestically. See Scott and St. Croix, for example. It will be interesting to see if this serves as a model for other industries of if we’ll instead sadly remember this as the shadow of the once thriving U.S. manufacturing base.
