Teen’s Fly-Tying Business Also A Pleasure

The Dallas Morning News:

During a telephone interview, Malic Poole, 14, sounds like a normal, smart, enthusiastic eighth-grader who loves fishing. One fact separates this young man from hundreds of other Dallas-area teenagers who also love to fish.

Poole has his own tackle business, called Flies By Night. Though he does not fish with fly tackle, he spends two to three hours most days tying flies. An angler and retailer of the new millennium, Poole’s handspun flies are a hot commodity on Web sites such as finnytribe.com, and he gets plenty of attention from the Texas Fishing Forum.

The young entrepreneur has his own Web site, with a link to his e-mail and a photo of his product, a variation of the Clouser Minnow, one of the most popular streamer patterns ever invented.

Poole got interested in fly tying while on a fishing trip with his father, Brad Poole, and family friend, Mike Oser of Mesquite. Oser gave Malic a fly-tying kit that included materials, a vice to hold the hook and an introductory video.

Brad and his twin brother, Bryan, own a chain of retail stores called Sample House in the Dallas area, and Malic has learned a lot more than most kids his age about running a business.

“He knows how it works,” Brad said. “Most teenagers don’t know much about what their dad does other than he leaves home every morning and comes back in the evening. Malic has learned that business success is 99 percent dependent on customer service.”

When Malic gets home from school in the afternoon, he first takes care of homework and studies for any tests that may be approaching. Only then does he set up his fly-tying equipment and go to work. It usually takes him about a minute to complete a Fly By Night lure, which sells for $1.50. Most nights, he works until 10:30 or 11 p.m.

Photo by Flies By Night.

« Previous Post

Next Post »