Dont negotiate , just go to a local SCI
banquet, you can steal them there.
Just came back from one in phila., Pa
a 5 day hunt for 2 hunters and 2 non hunters
included full board and fees on impala and springbok went for a mere $1100 . Had i not picked the wrong time to be in the mens room,
i might have had it for $1200. I felt sad for the outfitter who donated it, here he is kind enough to donate a 7k trip and it didnt even bring 20%. i wonder how long he will keep donating to them ?

I wonder how long he'll stay in business.....

That is why I and other Ph's I know, do not donate hunts. It cheapens the industry. At last year's NAPHA special meeting held in March, it was suggested that donation by Namibian hunting companies, guest farms and hunting farms should be limited by law, maybe as little as 10 a year, and that they where reserved for upcoming guys. I hope it happens someday...
BTW, shakari, we might not agree on some things in life, but you are spot on with your comments in this post!

If there were no "donated" hunts, SCI will go out of business!

They have made an art out of blackmailing those in the African hunting industry to "donate" hunts or they might no get space at the show.

Karl,

Thanks.

Saeed,

You really hit the nail on the head. The donation system is exactly that.... BLACKMAIL.

What else can it be when you pay for a booth, pay extra for power, carpeting, furniture & cleaning etc and then have to donate a hunt to get a good location. - I'm actually suprised it's not illegal. - It damn well should be.

As the world economy slows and big ticket luxury items such as safari hunting bookings start to tumble. You will be able to negotiate price. Right now with strong bookings it is much more difficult in many cases impossible as the companies don't need to negotiate price.

Back in 2002 I had several Tanzanian companies asking me to make an offer as they needed the booking. The deal I made was full daily fees but they picked up the charter from Dar to kilombero and return. And that is with a major company who is going strong then and now.

Do I think I could get the same deal right now? No but if the economy keeps going the way it has I'll bet you that there will be lots of deals to be had next season.

I've negotiated price with several big name companies in Tanzania and Zimbabwe in the past. Right now the market is a bit tighter.

I've heard however that while the high dollar 21 day safari market is still strong, guys who have big money always have big money, but that the industry is starting to see a slump in the 7 and 10 day market. I.E. the average Joe is feeling the pain.

With all due respect A guy like Saeed hardly needs to negotiate price on anything. With oil at $102 a barrel yesterday Saeed is hardly the guy to talk to about economizing on anything! His cash cup runnith over I venture to say.

Booking agents and outfitters will always tell you that the price is not negotiable, initially. So will a car dealer, initially. Business is business I don't care if it's the hunting business or the local cat house everything is negotiable when you cut out the middle man.

quote:

- believe me, you'd make more money running a supermarket or driving a truck than you do hunting. ..

Thanks for that Steve but you shoot more dg

Rudi,

Very true...... they call it one of the perks of the job!

When I think of "negotiating" a safari, I think of trying to create a hunt not normally offered. For example:

a plains game hunt (+/- buffalo) in Tanzania of less than 21 days with the understanding that no cats or elephants are to be hunted.

a 2 area hunt of 14-16 days where the outfitter normally sells just 10 day hunts in either area.

I wouldn't expect to try to haggle over trophy fees or daily rates, but if a "deal" can be worked out to tailor make a hunt that all parties can agree to, everybody wins.

quote:

When I think of "negotiating" a safari, I think of trying to create a hunt not normally offered. For example:

a plains game hunt (+/- buffalo) in Tanzania of less than 21 days with the understanding that no cats or elephants are to be hunted.

a 2 area hunt of 14-16 days where the outfitter normally sells just 10 day hunts in either area.

I wouldn't expect to try to haggle over trophy fees or daily rates, but if a "deal" can be worked out to tailor make a hunt that all parties can agree to, everybody wins.

Caleb, I think most outfitters in Southern Africa will be willing to make such a type of deal to an extend, especially towards the end of the season, though I do not think Tanzania allows such a deal. Someone with Tz experience (shakari maybe?0 will chime in.

Surestrike,
That is just a bald face lie, or your just full of shit, one or the other...I don't add one red cent to an outfit, I charge exactly what they offer their hunts at in THEIR brochures and I send out THEIR brochures..

Some guys, like you, go to Africa or Alaska, or where ever one time and come back all knowing...A little knowledge is a dangerous thing comes to my mind.

It cost nothing to use a legitamate booking agent, he has already done all the ground work for you and "most" of the better outfits use us because they are too booked up, thus too busy to do their own booking. Others use us because we bring them additional revenue..

You don't have to use booking agents, that is your choice but cut the crap, you don't have a clue what your spewing and that is pure

Ray,

Why don't you pull your head out of your ass and read what I wrote!

I am fully aware of how the booking industry gets paid. You get a 15% + or - commission on daily fees from the quoted price. There is no visible booking agent add on.

The outfitter has to have that percentage worked into his advertised daily fee if he uses booking agents.

If you saw anything to the contrary in any of my posts you are either mistaken or extremely defensive.'


Or are you trying to tell the good people on this forum that you work for free?

If the above is incorrect why don't you explain to all the nice people how booking agents do get paid.



Talk about a bunch of

PS I've been to Africa a hell of a lot more than once and worked as a bush pilot in AK for 5 years. So please feel free to kiss my rosy red ASS you SOB!

Where would outfitters be with out SCI and their chapters. I include DSC in this although they are independent they started as SCI. Just shut down these shows and see where the outfitters and agents go to sell their product. I am not saying SCI is totally correct and some of the "donated hunts" require the bidder to bring X number of other hunters at full rates and the "donated hunts" quite often are discounted hunts or done on a 50/50 basis. I find getting "full donated" hunts very hard to come by for our chapter banquet. As always there are two sides or maybe more to all situations.

Ray would you care to comment on the below quote from the below thread.

Written by Ray Atkinson.

" As a booking agent I have had PHs offer the client a discount that amounted to my commission, not to go through me again but to come direct to them.. The clients in most cases would return and tell me of the offer and I would drop the Safari company....

The safari company always called and denied it and had all kinds of excuses when it dawned on them that they had just cut off the hand that fed them and their family..

I would never book for them again under any circumstances and I still get emails from them wanting to start over. It's amazing how dumb greed can make some folks.

If a client goes direct to Pierre and books a hunt, Pierre sends me a commission, simple as that and I never had to tell him to do that, in fact I told him he didn't need to do that if he booked a client on his own, but he chose otherwise, and btw it has paid off for him in spades..I will work my butt off for an honest safari company..."


Ray Atkinson
Atkinson Hunting Adventures
10 Ward Lane,
Filer, Idaho, 83328
208-326-4120

https://forums.accuratereloading.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/1411043/m/549109818

Now how can you sit there and you tell me that there isn't a mark up in the daily fee to allow for booking commissions?

I know intimately how the business works. You may sit there and try to BS the rest of these guys but you'd better be careful before you try that shit on me!

I tend to think like Steve and Saeed. I do not want something for nothing because that is what I will get.

I have booked a whoping 2 safari's - one to RSA and one to Zim. The one to RSA was done direct with the outfit and we had 15 people going with 8 shooters. Total bag was estimated at 75 animals. We negotiated a little bit but in the end, we had such a great time, we gave the 5% discount back to them in tips. I will try to never be a booking agent again. The hunt turned out great, but dealing with my friends nearly ended a couple of friendships.

My second hunt was booked through an agent. He did what he said he would do as did the outfit we hunted with. There were no suprises and only a couple of small problems. Plus, if something went wrong, I could hunt down the agent and choke the life out of him.

My future hunts will be through agents or direct with someone like Steve (Shakari) who is very familiar with arranging the hunts and logistics. They earn their money for having to deal with questions and problems ad nauseum.

I wish that travel agents were getting paid by the airline companies instead of me as I have not seen the benefit to the customer for this. The price of airline tickets is higher than it was and the quality of service does not exist with the airlines.

OH well, as I have learned in life - you get what you pay for....

Surestrike,
You bet I'l comment..You don't know squat, your just trying to BS your way through this, my prices are the same as the prices listed on the brochures that I send out, The Safari company sends me THEIR BROCHUES with thier price lists...If the Safari Company or myself discounts a Safari, then I get my comm. based on the discounted price, we all give up a little, but we gain the client, and we both make more money than if we just walked away from the deal, at least up to a point..surely you can understand that!

Like I said your as full of shit as a Christmas turkey, and are spewing about something you obviously have little or no knowledge other than that which you wrongly percieve...

I don't try and tell you how to run your business nor do I have the gall to spew shit like your doing about something I know nothing about.

You can do whatever you want and so can anyone else, I have no problem with how anyone goes to Africa, that is their business, but do everyone a favor and stick to the truth, you're just lieing your ass off about something you absolutly know nothing about.

quote:

Originally posted by Atkinson:
Surestrike,
You don't know squat, your just trying to BS your way through this, my prices are the same as the prices listed on the brochures that I send out, The Safari company sends me THEIR BROCHUES...

And the safari company pays you a 15% commission on the daily fee. That is how a booking agent gets paid. Just like I SAID!

That is common knowledge Ray so what's got your panties in such a bunch!

You yourself explained it in the above quoted thread! Why is it so threating to you here?

You accuse me of lying my ass of when all I said was that the booking agent gets a commission on the daily fees. And in some places in South Africa they get a commission on trophy fees too!

Are you going to try and refute that?

Ray,

Due to the fact that you changed this post after reading my reply I'm going to quote you so that we can try and stick to the facts.

The whole problem here is that you are reading a bunch of crap into my posts that isn't their.

Ray the mere fact that you don't remember who I am or what I do tells me that you are having some serious memory issues.

Have you been medically screened for Alzheimer's? If not it may be time. Judging from your lack of understanding lack of memory and your aggressive illogical replies I'm guessing that you may have the start of serious problem.

But I hope for your sake that your just being a jerk for fun.

quote:

Originally posted by Atkinson:
Surestrike,
You bet I'l comment..You don't know squat, your just trying to BS your way through this, my prices are the same as the prices listed on the brochures that I send out, The Safari company sends me THEIR BROCHUES with thier price lists...If the Safari Company or myself discounts a Safari, then I get my comm. based on the discounted price, we all give up a little, but we gain the client, and we both make more money than if we just walked away from the deal, at least up to a point..surely you can understand that!

Like I said your as full of shit as a Christmas turkey, and are spewing about something you obviously have little or no knowledge other than that which you wrongly percieve...

I don't try and tell you how to run your business nor do I have the gall to spew shit like your doing about something I know nothing about.

You can do whatever you want and so can anyone else, I have no problem with how anyone goes to Africa, that is their business, but do everyone a favor and stick to the truth, you're just lieing your ass off about something you absolutly know nothing about.

quote:

Originally posted by Karl S:

quote:

When I think of "negotiating" a safari, I think of trying to create a hunt not normally offered. For example:

a plains game hunt (+/- buffalo) in Tanzania of less than 21 days with the understanding that no cats or elephants are to be hunted.

a 2 area hunt of 14-16 days where the outfitter normally sells just 10 day hunts in either area.

I wouldn't expect to try to haggle over trophy fees or daily rates, but if a "deal" can be worked out to tailor make a hunt that all parties can agree to, everybody wins.

Caleb, I think most outfitters in Southern Africa will be willing to make such a type of deal to an extend, especially towards the end of the season, though I do not think Tanzania allows such a deal. Someone with Tz experience (shakari maybe?0 will chime in.

Area changes are not impossible by any means and are fairly easy and not uncommon, (esp on a 21 day licence) if both areas concerned are leased to the same or the same group of companies. If it's different companies, although not impossible, it's not easy and doesn't happen very often

FWIW, Ray Atkinson doesn't represent me, has never sent me a client and I've never met him, but I do know him by reputation, and I've never heard of him jacking up the price of a safari at all. In fact, quite the contrary, I've heard of occasions where he's declined his commission because he knew the outfitter concerned was having problems for some reason.

There are two kinds of agent. The good guys who are experienced and know what they're doing. These guys are in the vast minority and the 'instant experts' who have hardly spent time in Africa at all..... these are in the VAST majority and are simply not only useless, they're f****ng useless.

Ray falls firmly into the former catagory.

quote:

These guys are in the vast minority and the 'instant experts' who have hardly spent time in Africa at all..... these are in the VAST majority and are simply not only useless, they're f****ng useless.

You mean like George Leonard Herter

Who was an expert on EVERYTHING?

Wasn't the one who has written that one needs a drum of peanut butter spread on the trunk of a tree to get the elephants to come close?

Seriuosly though, we have had one or two of those "instant experts" who went to Africa - or at least claimed to have done - and started booking hunts!

The world is full of dreamers who fall in love with what they percieve as the glamour of Africa and it's hunting industry, Some come and spend a week or two here and become instant experts and some don't even come at all, they just read a few books and think they know what's going on. We had a so called hunting agent from the UK contact us a few years ago, who told us that he had a group of hunters that he had told could come to SA with us and hunt grant's and thomson's gazelles and how much commission would we pay him........ Needless to say, that one didn't fly.

Then we had some other idiot contact us who told us that as he had a masters degree in medieval history and had been president of his university clay pigeon club, but had never shot a rifle, he was ideally suited to be given a job as a PH with us and how much were we willing to pay him..... needless to say, that one didn't fly either.

All it takes is the ability to set up a website and a phone line and the guy is suddenly an agent. Hell, in the past, we've even found some of these people have copied and pasted info from our site onto theirs without even asking permission.

A good agent can be worth his (or her) weight in gold, if they know what they're doing and they don't bullshit, but a bad one is an absolute nightmare. - The problem is sifting the good from the not so good, and that ain't easy!

Talk is cheap but money buys the WISKEY
beware of the guy who promises you the world its either a cheap and nasty or a premuim product. will you trust a new Premuim bullet that is priced like a practise bullet i think the answer is no

If its about the hunt and not the trophy shooting females in SA will save you between 15-25% on trophy fees

Surestrike:
Better be careful there buddy. I understand Filer Idaho has an excellent law firm, name of , Duwee Cheetum and Howe. You may receive an online response from them. You might want to contact Sheephunter, I think he knows the outfit.
bluefin:
The only way you will know if an item is negotiable, is ask. The worst they can do is say, No.