When Kenny Kavanaugh first got in the sporting goods business at K&M Coffee, Corks and Camo on the shores of Lake D’Arbonne in Farmerville almost two years ago, he quickly learned that everybody had a good idea about what he needed to stock in the store.
Some were good ideas. Some weren’t so good. But one thing he heard early and often was “You gonna get Googan?” Of course, he told the fishermen he’d look into it, but soon that became the most asked question he heard.
And it was coming from a bunch of “kids”.
“Seriously, we kept hearing from young fishermen almost every day about Googan baits,” Kenny said. “I’d never heard of them. There was a young man named Hayden Davis of Ruston. He’s 13 years old and he asked every time he came in the store. Finally I asked him about it and he rattled off everything you could possibly know about baits and the company that made them. I was impressed. He told me about one new product that was announced at noon that day. It was about 2 p.m. I offered him a job on the spot. He laughed and said he’d think about it. Then I went and looked Googan up, made a small order and got them in the store.”
Shout out to Googan: You should send the young man a few packs of fishing worms!
When that first small box was opened and put on the counter at K&M, the young anglers coming into the store bought every one of them before Kenny could even get them priced and on the shelf. It won’t surprise you to know that there is now a full wall of Googan fishing gear. And it has to be restocked regularly. Kenny got it.
And he got Googan.
Googan has taken it’s place among the big boys of bass lures in a short time. Their baits like Saucy Swimmer, Slim Shake, Rattlin Ned, Lunker Log and Mondo Worm are popular all over the country. And they’ve become that way through a group of young fishermen that have become almost a cult-like fish following of the Googan Squad. They have their own YouTube channel and get millions of views. In fact, there are almost 800,000 subscribers. In the fall of 2016, 5 young anglers, Lake Fork Guy, Jon B., Peric, Flair, and Lunkers –– as they’re known to the fans of their YouTube fishing videos — banded together, creating what is now a modern day dream-team in the fishing scene. Their videos are mostly fishing, but the creativity is unbridled. One recent edition shows some of the Googan Squad going fishing when they stop by the drive in window at McDonald’s and order one of each off the entire menu. Just to do it. It was about $100 worth of fast food!
As you might imagine, the Googan squad hasn’t been without some controversy. Haters gonna hate. And maybe their are reasons. But I don’t care. It’s a pretty neat story.
“Now it isn’t just the kids,” Kavanaugh says. “It’s the adults, too. And the baits are catching fish. Man, they hit the lottery with that marketing plan. I think the sky’s the limit.”
If you want to keep up, you better get to Googan. Here’s a look at the home page for their YouTube page. Who says you can’t teach an old dog a new trick. Especially when it involves fishing.
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