- It turns out that in 2022, Americans spent a staggering $394 billion on hunting, fishing, and outdoor trips! This includes expenses for purchasing equipment, obtaining licenses, and the trips themselves.
- And you know how many trips they made that year? 1.7 billion! This number is no less staggering than $394 billion 😉
- With such a high number of trips, it’s time to create our own “Airbnb for outdoor trips,” following the example of this startup:
Project Essence
Mallard Bay is a place where you can find and book hunting, fishing, or just outdoor trips.
All trips are led by experienced guides. Trips can be single-day or multi-day, they may include cabins for accommodation, or travelers may have to camp in tents they bring along. Depending on the theme, duration, and conditions, the cost of a trip can range from $150 to $15,000 per person.
For travelers, the service is convenient because they can search for suitable trips, learn details, book spots, and have access to customer support to quickly and authoritatively resolve any issues that may arise. One could say that Mallard Bay is the “Airbnb for hunting, fishing, and outdoor adventures.”
For guides, the startup provides a comprehensive solution that allows them to attract travelers, create tours, accept bookings, and payment for them.
Guides can attract travelers on the Mallard Bay marketplace, through Google search, or via email newsletters—the startup platform allows utilizing all these possibilities.
If a guide doesn’t have their own website or wants to improve it, they can create and maintain their website on the Mallard Bay platform. Websites created on the platform can be integrated with booking tools and payment acceptance from users, and guides can access booking schedules and CRM for communication with their clients in their personal account.
The startup’s payment system supports the option of making a 50% deposit upon booking, automatically deducting the remaining amount after the start of the trip, and group payments with splitting the total payment amount among group participants.
Guides can use the platform for free or pay a subscription fee of $99 per month. The paid subscription includes:
- the ability to integrate bookings into the guide’s website,
- reduced commission rates for accepting payments for trips,
- a 50% discount on additional platform services.
There are quite a few additional services—customizing the website created on the platform, search engine optimization tools, the ability to place ads on Google, social media management, assistance in creating content for the website and social networks, connecting a store to sell their own merchandise, and other useful and profitable features.
In 2023, Mallard Bay processed travel payments totaling $6 million, and in 2024 plans to increase this volume to $30–35 million. Such a leap could be real because in 2023, the booking volume increased by 7 times compared to 2022, and the transaction volume for January 2024 exceeded the transaction volume for the entire 2022 and was almost equal to the transaction volume for the first quarter of 2023.
The startup’s marketplace features 380 guides from 38 US states and 7 countries worldwide, and the marketplace’s services have already been used by over 4,500 travelers.
Currently, Mallard Bay has raised $4.6 million in new investments, increasing the total investment in the project to $6.6 million.
What’s Interesting
Despite such good dynamics, in one of the interviews, the founder of Mallard Bay lamented that it was difficult for him to raise a new round of investments. During the investment attraction process, he contacted almost 300 investors, but most of them refused—because they “didn’t feel the topic” or didn’t see the potential in it.
It’s not surprising, as at first glance, I would also consider this topic not particularly interesting. And I would be wrong 😉
It turns out that in 2022, Americans spent a staggering $394 billion on hunting, fishing, and outdoor trips!
However, this amount includes not only the trips themselves but also the payment for equipment and licenses. Nevertheless, the number of trips is also impressive—1.7 billion trips in 2022! For a market of this size, a “dedicated Airbnb” is indeed needed 😉
If we look at the activities by category, we’ll see the following picture.
In 2022, nearly 14.5 million people went hunting, each of whom made an average of 11 trips with a total duration of 17 days. Each hunter spent an average of over $3,000 during the year, of which $857 was spent on trips. In total, hunters spent $45 billion on their hobby in 2022.
In 2022, almost 40 million Americans went fishing, each making an average of 12 trips per year with a total duration of 20 days. Each angler spent an average of $2,500 during the year, of which $917 was spent on trips. In total, fishermen spent $99.4 billion in the year.
In 2022, 148 million Americans went outdoors, with 96 million of them observing birds in natural conditions. Outdoor travelers made an average of 7 trips with a total duration of 88 days. Such travelers spent $1.7 thousand per year, of which $284 was spent on trips. In total, Americans spent $250 billion on this category.
I already touched on the topic of hunting and fishing in 2021, but the startups at that time mainly earned money by selling equipment.
GoWild is a community of outdoor enthusiasts, with a primary focus on hunting. This startup raised $8.3 million in investments.
Catch Co focused on fishing. It raised $61.3 million in investments.
Where to Go
I often say that for startups to succeed, they need not only a large market but also a big idea.
The aforementioned Catch Co has formulated such an idea for itself. They believe that their goal is to “save humanity from the four walls” in which we currently spend most of our lives 😉 “We’re not about attracting our friends to fish because they like fishing. We’re about saving civilization from a future where people only go out into nature in virtual reality. And the reason we’re into fishing is that it allows us to go out into real nature with some meaning, history, and tradition.”
But even the devil with a big idea 😉 Outdoor trips—whether it’s hunting, fishing, birdwatching, or just leisure—are surprisingly big markets.
Moreover, it’s a market that few startups pay attention to. This gives good chances to those who do pay attention to it.
So, the possible direction of movement is the creation of services for outdoor trips, which may include both the trips themselves and the purchase of equipment and gear for them.
The model of today’s Mallard Bay is a good example to emulate since it doesn’t focus on selling physical goods, which requires money for purchasing these goods, maintaining warehouses, logistics, and brings along other e-commerce hassles. Making money out of thin air is much more pleasant 😉
About the Company
Mallard Bay
Website: mallardbay.com
Latest Round: $4.6M, 03/18/2024
Total Investments: $6.6M, Rounds: 4