"If you take a look around the country, not everybody has a Cabela's, so this is a big deal that Cleveland got one," said Marketing Manager Garry Gerrone.
AVON, Ohio -- The grand opening of Cabela's first Northeast Ohio outdoors superstore is still 17 days away, but some of the employees are already pumped.
Like its three other Ohio stores, Cabela's Avon focuses on hunting, fishing, camping and shooting sports, along with the related clothing, equipment and accessories. Employees walk around the 70,000-square-foot store dressed head-to-toe in Cabela's caps, tan shirts, camouflage pants and boots, under and among wildlife displays that feature dozens of mounted stuffed animals.
Cabela's, based in Sidney, Nebraska, will open its Avon store at 9:45 a.m. Aug. 11, with a ribbon-cutting performed not with scissors but with a bow and arrow fired by a store employee.
"The Cavaliers' championship parade and the RNC were the dress rehearsals for Cabela's opening," said Marketing Manager Garry Gerrone. "I'm serious. I can't go anywhere without people asking, 'When are you opening?' or [saying] 'Well, there goes my paycheck!'
"If you take a look around the country, not everybody has a Cabela's, so this is a big deal that Cleveland got one," he said. "My job is to keep that momentum going."
The Avon store, which employs nearly 200 and is still hiring, is Cabela's fourth Ohio store in four years. The Columbus store opened in 2013, the West Chester store near Cincinnati opened in 2015, and the Centerville store near Dayton opened earlier this year.
The Avon store, at 35685 Chester Road, sits north of and is visible from Interstate 90, and is accessible off of Exit 153.
When the first customers walk in the front doors, they will see the hunting section on their left and the fishing section on their right. "It's broken down into experiences" rather than departments, Gerrone said. "If you learn this store and go to Columbus, you'll know where everything is."
"We can outfit your hike on the Appalachian Trail, or we can outfit your backyard barbecue," he said.
Dennis McMahon, a dressed-for-the-part fly-fishing outfitter practicing his casts in the aisles, says Cabela's fishing department is geared for fresh-water fishing, from flies and lures to live and frozen bait. When he goes fishing up in Canada, he takes 100 dozen worms with him, and he says the store will carry bait buckets and aerators, too.
Jim Zemek, a fishing outfitter, is also an avid angler who takes regular trips to northern Ontario to catch muskies and northern pike. "They call muskies 'the fish of 1,000 casts,' and northern pike are incredible fighting fish," he said. He catches, weighs, takes pictures with, and then releases his catches, explaining: "You can eat them, but you have to have someone who knows how to prepare them."
Gerrone said: "We call our staff 'outfitters' for a reason. Because they know their stuff." He spent 30 years with the Lorain County Metro Parks and five years with the city of Avon Lake Parks and Recreation before working at Cabela's. "I fish, camp and hike a lot."
"Six weeks ago, this was empty," he said of the store. Cabela's employees helped empty the trucks, assembled the shelves and display units, and put away the merchandise so they would know where everything is. "It was an amazing job."
Sean Cutright, a general outdoors lead who transferred from the Cabela's in Wheeling, West Virginia, raved about Cabela's $250 Polar Cap brand cooler, which was recently rated No. 1 among its peers after being tossed off a speeding truck in an "Ice-Chest Throwdown" by Field & Stream magazine.
Of the more than 2,000 people who applied at Cabela's, only 700 were invited in for interviews, and only about 180 were hired. Remaining openings are listed at cabelas.jobs (search by location).
Dale Dike, an outfitter in the gun library (used gun shop), said Cabela's attracts employees like himself who grew up hunting and enjoying the outdoors.
"If you're just looking for a job, you don't want to work here," agreed David Stearns, a firearms outfitter, tapping his chest. "You have to have it in here. It's got to be a part of your nature."
Katie "Camo" Loeser, an outfitter in hunting, walked around the store in an "Outfit Her" woman's hunting outfit that she hopes Cabela's lets her keep. Growing up in a family of hunters (she got her first license at 10 and shot her first white-tailed deer that weekend), she said she grew up wearing her grandfather's or father's hunting clothes, having to hike up her too-baggy pants while crouched in a tree stand.
"We sell fun," she said. "I don't come here to do work; I come here to have fun."
Joe Begich, an outfitter in firearms, said he was a fan of Cabela's long before he started working there, because he heard about how Dick and Mary Cabela started the company from their kitchen table in 1961, selling hand-tied fishing flies via mail-order catalog from Chappell, Nebraska.
When Jeff Korona, an outfitter in the gun library, showed off his range of duck calls, Begich and Stearns both stopped what they were doing and aimed their imaginary rifles in the air, as Loeser laughed.
The Backpackers Shop, a father-and-son-owned outdoors specialty store about 10 minutes away from Cabela's in the village of Sheffield, has also been watching the store ramp up for its grand opening.
"We just celebrated our 50th anniversary as a third-generation, family-owned business in the same location for 50 years," said Erica Fabbro, daughter-in-law of Reece Fabbro and wife of Thomas Fabbro. "We have some things in common with what they sell, but we also have a lot of higher-end products made by companies that are really supportive of specialty retail and small businesses and won't sell in big-box stores.
"Cabela's has a big hunting department, and we have a lot of customers who are offended by that," she said. "But we also have backpacking, camping, fly fishing, kayaking, travel clothing, winter outerwear and specialty clothing."
Nevertheless, "we're definitely expecting it to affect our sales. Ultimately, we're expecting our sales to drop for about six months to one year and hopefully bounce back after that," she said. "At least, that's what we're hoping to see."