Dalton York Safaris Re-sign The Omay for 5 years

[BRICKBURN]

As someone who both provides hunts as an outfitter and books hunts as a hunter (sees both sides of the industry), I would advise you all to ask your outfitters before booking (especially when booking well in advance) as to how long the lease where you are hunting is in effect and if it expires before or after your hunt. Seems it is quite common in Africa for outfitters to accept bookings well in advance even when their leases don’t extend that far. That’s probably acceptable if they let you know something could change and have a fair refund policy. If they persuade you to hunt another ranch or concession, that’s fine but you should know where you are hunting before your trip.

Something to add to the BETTER QUESTIONS thread.

 

[revturbo9967]

Keep beating that dead horse Scott!….. He might just get up and take saddle.

I see nothing wrong in the advice he’s providing regardless of the content in this thread. This very well could have gone in a different direction, so asking the outfit how long they have the property and any details associated could save a huge headache or financial loss. I will be certain to ask this question in the future.

 

[WAB]

I see nothing wrong in the advice he’s providing regardless of the content in this thread. This very well could have gone in a different direction, so asking the outfit how long they have the property and any details associated could save a huge headache or financial loss. I will be certain to ask this question in the future.

Agreed!

 

[Hank2211]

I appreciate your perspective. What industry are you in?

As an outfitter, ranches that allow hunting are hard to find. Ranches that will lease to an outfitter are even harder to find. As I mentioned in an earlier post, some industries are in a bigger, open marketplace such as selling widgets to a huge nationwide market or any number of other large industries with lots of products, suppliers and customers to go around. Quality ranches and government permits/leases are very hard to find and small in number.

I am very good to my employees and have guides that have been with me for 20+ years. Most are close friends that would never stab me in the back or try to take a lease away from me. I pay them more than anyone in the industry and they have company credit cards and incur no out of pocket expenses. However, I was once burned and new guides now sign non-compete documents. I don’t force anyone to work for me but if they choose to, I expect loyalty and a big work ethic. In exchange, they are paid more than the industry standard, work in a very organized environment, have top quality equipment available to them and good clients who tip.

Scott, I was in the legal business for many years, and our young associates (and sometimes partners) would leave to go to other firms, to start their own firms or to go in-house. I later moved to the business side of the oil and gas business, and employees would often go elsewhere for a promotion, more money, or again, to start their own business. Then I retired, and now I and some partners own a retail business, where staff come and go all the time.

I respect your position, but I can say that i've never had a problem with other people's decisions to do what was in their best interests, at least as they saw it. That's not to say that I didn't find it difficult from time to time, but I never blamed the person in pursuit of what they saw as a better opportunity (I did get mad once, but that was when an employee left and took a copy of our customers' email addresses with him . . . that was theft!).

 

[Tokoloshe Safaris]

In Zimbabwe being awarded a Lease contract involves so much more than offering highest dollar amount. Some of these items are, tax clearances, Operators license, years in operation, where you advertise, organizations that you belong to past performance (including payments made on time) community involvement, roads, diesel and long list of documents. It is very easy for your bid not to be accepted over 1 missing or outdated document. I am not saying this is what happened in this case, but the possibility exists. Oh, did I mention politics?

Things are changing in Matetsi. I highly recommend that you keep in contact with your outfitter.

 

[Rich s]

When traveling abroad and where tens of thousands of dollars are involved. Perhaps travelers insurance is money well spent. In case a trip would be cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances.

 

[Hank2211]

In Zimbabwe being awarded a Lease contract involves so much more than offering highest dollar amount. Some of these items are, tax clearances, Operators license, years in operation, where you advertise, organizations that you belong to past performance (including payments made on time) community involvement, roads, diesel and long list of documents. It is very easy for your bid not to be accepted over 1 missing or outdated document. I am not saying this is what happened in this case, but the possibility exists. Oh, did I mention politics?

Things are changing in Matetsi. I highly recommend that you keep in contact with your outfitter.

I don’t mean to hijack the thread, but what do you mean when you say that things are changing in Matetsi?

 

[375Fox]

When traveling abroad and where tens of thousands of dollars are involved. Perhaps travelers insurance is money well spent. In case a trip would be cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances.

I don’t think trip cancellation insurance is worth the cost in Africa. If this situation didn’t work itself out, they still would have found alternative hunts in different areas. Managing areas on quota and long seasons gives a lot of options to reschedule in the same year. Small deposits with final payments after the hunt takes most risk away from the client. It’s not an elk hunt where 50% deposit is paid up front with rest on arrival and you are locked into your 1 week slot because a short season. In Africa, I’d discuss an outfitter’s cancellation policy and payment schedule before I ever considered paying trip cancellation insurance.

 

[CAustin]

After all the debate, questionable claims and confusion………..Dalton & York Safaris have re-signed the Omay for the next 5 years.

In my view a well deserved result to a messy and non supportive debacle.

Anyone hunting or booked with them can now breathe easy and look forward to a fantastic experience with a true pair of hunters! I can’t wait to book my next one!

The Omay is calling me back with D&Y of course.

 

[CAustin]

Wheels up Aug 7!

Qatar Airways???

 

[CAustin]

Absolutely true for business in a large open industry. But safari areas are not an open marketplace. It’s a zero sum game for limited areas and can lead to hard feelings.

I disagree. it’s a business like so many others. In any business people grow and naturally want to branch out to better themselves…..and that goes for Safari operations too. If you want to keep your business (Safari area) you compete. Competition generally makes products and services better For the consumer. A person running a business also needs to keep employees happy and give them opportunities to grow and advance. Fail in this and those same people will become your competition.
For over 33 years I competed with many restaurants for business every day and as such I knew that my product and service had to be better than the next place down the road in order to stay in business and make a profit. Over the years I developed many leaders in my organization some of whom became internal competitors. Didn’t bother me one bit and it still doesn’t. Heck I even groomed and got the man promoted who replaced me! No hard feelings ….in fact I recently coached him for a new position he took with another company.
I am sure you are correct when you point out that Safari areas are not wide open. For that reason alone the Safari operation had better hold on to a given area and provide legendary service Year over year. Then watch people flock to your place for the hunt of a lifetime. D&Y had a tiny booth off the beaten path at SCI Nashville. The booth was constantly full of people wanting to meet them and discuss hunting opportunities.
The smell test you mentioned sure took place but it wasn’t necessitated by Dalton Tink. Someone else started a thread on here stating that he had obtained the rights to the Omay. I think we all know now that at best that was premature.

 

[CAustin]

Scott, I have read your comments and have to chime in.

The timing of MP post claiming rights to the Omay was definitely premature and to be fair, I believe it was intended to cause confusion and concern amongst D&Y’s clients and potential clients.

As you correctly say, it IS a small industry and personally I found the approach to be very unbecoming of a “professional” outfit. MP knew full well that it was far from settled when he made his announcement. Call it poor judgement, call it what you want……..but it wasn’t cool.

There are plenty of outfitters and PH’s who compete and cooperate really well across Southern Africa, which given the small size of the Zim PH industry makes this entire thing leave a bad taste.

This was the reason that I started the thread, to set the record straight. I didn’t want to leave a post with his misleading “title” as the last say about the Omay. People booking and looking to book, can get some accurate fair info now.

I certainly tried not to start a finger pointing exercise - I hope you will agree - so maybe let’s just leave this with the view that we now know who has the rights to the Omay and hunters can book with confidence.

That’s my 5 cents.

Five cents well spent!

 

[Scott CWO]

Scott, I was in the legal business for many years, and our young associates (and sometimes partners) would leave to go to other firms, to start their own firms or to go in-house. I later moved to the business side of the oil and gas business, and employees would often go elsewhere for a promotion, more money, or again, to start their own business. Then I retired, and now I and some partners own a retail business, where staff come and go all the time.

I respect your position, but I can say that i've never had a problem with other people's decisions to do what was in their best interests, at least as they saw it. That's not to say that I didn't find it difficult from time to time, but I never blamed the person in pursuit of what they saw as a better opportunity (I did get mad once, but that was when an employee left and took a copy of our customers' email addresses with him . . . that was theft!).

That’s a fine perspective and valid in your industry. There are many types of law to practice and lots of people need lawyers. However, once you are out of law school and pass the bar, there’s an open marketplace to practice and advertise your services to the general public. The government doesn’t limit the number of lawyers. The government does limit the number of outfitting permits on public land. We don’t overlap much and there’s a moratorium on new permits for public land outfitting areas and concessions in some states. Private land, of course, is different. As I said before, there are only so many ranches available to outfitters. If my employees all decided to quit and go out on there own, they would have to compete with me for the same ranches. As for clients, we are always fully booked so I could care less about competing for clients. There’s plenty of clients to go around when you are successful and organized. It’s the concessions and ranches that cause issues, just like in this case with D&Y.

 

[Scott CWO]

I disagree. it’s a business like so many others. In any business people grow and naturally want to branch out to better themselves…..and that goes for Safari operations too. If you want to keep your business (Safari area) you compete. Competition generally makes products and services better For the consumer. A person running a business also needs to keep employees happy and give them opportunities to grow and advance. Fail in this and those same people will become your competition.
For over 33 years I competed with many restaurants for business every day and as such I knew that my product and service had to be better than the next place down the road in order to stay in business and make a profit. Over the years I developed many leaders in my organization some of whom became internal competitors. Didn’t bother me one bit and it still doesn’t. Heck I even groomed and got the man promoted who replaced me! No hard feelings ….in fact I recently coached him for a new position he took with another company.
I am sure you are correct when you point out that Safari areas are not wide open. For that reason alone the Safari operation had better hold on to a given area and provide legendary service Year over year. Then watch people flock to your place for the hunt of a lifetime. D&Y had a tiny booth off the beaten path at SCI Nashville. The booth was constantly full of people wanting to meet them and discuss hunting opportunities.
The smell test you mentioned sure took place but it wasn’t necessitated by Dalton Tink. Someone else started a thread on here stating that he had obtained the rights to the Omay. I think we all know now that at best that was premature.

I was in the restaurant business for nine years. I know it all too well. By the time my wife and I left, we managed five successful restaurants and we each worked 70 hours a week. I started as a dishwasher in college and became the Regional Manager after college and moving up the ladder.

The government doesn’t limit the number of restaurants. There are thousands of restaurants in Colorado. There are not thousands of ranches that work with outfitters. In Colorado, our Federal Permits for outfitting on public land are limited and there’s a moratorium in many areas. This is to prevent overcrowding.

It is very competitive for the ranches as well. If an employee quits, he probably isn’t easily going to find new ranches to lease. He’s going to try to take them from another outfitter. If one of my restaurant employees quit and started a restaurant, he wasn’t going to kick us out of our building. It’s a totally different industry and I have a lot of knowledge of them both.

I have great relationships with lots of other Colorado outfitters and guides. We don’t step on each other’s toes very often. I was elected to our association BOD several times by my peers and have been a stakeholder on several public working groups with the federal and state agencies over my 32 year career. I was a BOD for the United Sportmen’s Council of Colorado. The last several years, I have taken a step back from boards and politics due to family commitments, grandchildren and personal hunting. My employees are very important to me and I have taken some of them on trips.

 

[Jumbo]

Good evening thank you for your concern and comments but officially misinformed. I left Martin in 2018 to start on my own and free lanced it was all amicable and we were still very close . Unfortunately it’s not about loyalty in this circumstance it’s about right and wrong many thanks

Thanks for putting the record straight Dalton!

Couldn’t agree more!

 

[Philip Glass]

Qatar Airways???

No sir. They jacked the price up for business so we will just have to go with Delta for the foreseeable future.
Packed and ready!

 

[Rare Breed]

Qatar Airways???

Delta 200

 

[CAustin]

No sir. They jacked the price up for business so we will just have to go with Delta for the foreseeable future.
Packed and ready!

Nothing wrong with a Delta 200 flight especially if you get a plane with the updated Delta One Suites

 

[Hank2211]

Nothing wrong with a Delta 200 flight especially if you get a plane with the updated Delta One Suites

Cost depends on the route, I assume.

Qatar was cheapest (in business) for my flight to RSA next month.

Someone should compare a Q-suite with a Delta One suite . . .

 

[Philip Glass]

Cost depends on the route, I assume.

Qatar was cheapest (in business) for my flight to RSA next month.

Someone should compare a Q-suite with a Delta One suite . . .

The main difference is going to be food and service. Both are nice seats but Qatar is over the top with everything. I'll likely never be in Delta One unless I get extremely lucky. $5000 is about my limit for a plane ride.
I'll be in the Premium Select for the first time and will report on it.
My group will fly Delta, overnight at City Lodge, Airlink to HRE, and finally a charter to the Omay.
@TOBY458 , @Rare Breed and 1 more are with me.