A Most Unique Retail Experience

     In the category of "unique retail experiences," it is hard to top Bass Pro Shops. It has a Vegas-y approach to the great outdoors: super-sized and somewhat garish perhaps but always entertaining. Even its sign out front, complete with bleached antlers, is so big I couldn't fit it all into one picture frame.

     Bass Pro Shops is a national chain, and the closest one to me is in Manteca, which I visited on my way to Yosemite Park over the Labor Day weekend. In Yosemite I saw a deer, chipmunks, and several squawking jays where I made camp. But this was nothing compared to the wildlife I saw in only a half-hour of wandering the aisles at Bass Pro Shops.

Of course, the wildlife at Bass Pro Shops is not alive and often you see only the head of the animal detached from its body and mounted high on a wall. But the store is for more than just gun hunters; bow hunters and archers, bait fishermen, fly fishermen, campers, hikers, boaters, kayakers, RVers, ATVers, backyard barbecuers, and anyone in the market for a personalized shot glass or a "Home for the Insane Redneck Fishermen" welcome mat will love the place, as I explain further after the jump page.

     I am not sure if a Redneck Fishermen welcome mat is my cup of tea, or even personalized shot glasses. But there are lamps with bases made of antlers or carved in the form of wildlife, which I was thinking about bringing home as a surprise gift for my wife, but then I thought better of it because I'm not sure it'd fit into her sense of décor. Probably a good idea I restrained myself.

     "Restraint" is not, however, a thing you should generally bring to Bass Pro Shops. Better to have a wallet with plastic and a sense of appreciation for the marvelous excesses of the American merchandising imagination. In Manteca there is a giant three-story high fake redwood tree that you walk through when you enter the store. The only way to improve this, in my mind, is to make it a drive-through tree, perhaps with customers riding through it on one of the dirt bikes or ATVs that are on sale there. Other cool sights are the museum-sized fish tanks with live fish in them; there are also lots of plastic fish on display. Most impressive is a waterfall inside the building with a black bear perched on a ledge. Shoppers and tourists take pictures of themselves posed with this bear and the waterfall in the background. Now how many other retail shops can claim that?