Rods, blanks made start-to-finish in Texas

Composite Forge creates Made in the USA rods, blanks

Story by Craig Nyhus, Lone Star Outdoor News

Frank-Paul King took over as president of Temple Fork Outfitters from founder Rick Pope in 2016. At the time,the company’s rod blanks were being produced in South Korea. A few years later, supply-chain issues became frustrating, with pandemic-related mandates and lockdowns around the world, and widespread shortages of shipping containers, equipment, vehicles and increased transportation costs.

King and his business partner, Bob Penicka, who until 2020 was a partner and the general manager of the largest fishing rod factory in North America: Mexico-based Axiom North America, came to an unusual and to some, radical decision. They created a company and brought all of the rod manufacturing to Grand Prairie.

The original thought was to manufacture what was needed for TFO rods, but then the pair started thinking bigger, with a goal of creating a “Made in the USA” product option available to all American brands at a cost-competitive price.

The new and separate venture, called Composite Forge, makes blanks and even private label rods for companies, including TFO, while avoiding the supply chain issues. “Composite Forge is entirely a factory built to offer U.S. brands a ‘Made in the USA’ option,” King said. “It’s not related to TFO. The only thing we build are blanks and rods for other brands. TFO is one of those other brands.”

The 75,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art facility will allow Composite Forge to compete head-to-head with overseas factories, King said.

A proprietary digital blank design process is used, and production process improvements dramatically improve efficiency, resulting in a reduction in time from customer ideation to product delivery.

“From a transportation standpoint, our central location will reduce new product turn-around from months to days,” King said. “We’re committed to sharing the ‘Made in the USA’ opportunity with other brands.”

Composite Forge isn’t the first company to take its rod-building in-house. St. Croix Rod, based in Wisconsin, also has a “Made in the USA” operation. But Composite Forge will be the first large-scale production facility in the U.S. that will serve multiple brands.

“We are overwhelmed with demand,” King said. “We suspected it would be well-received, but not like this. As we continue to grow production to meet demand. There are lots of high-quality brands that wanted the ‘Made in the USA’ option, but we didn’t realize so many brands would be immediately interested.”

King and Penicka believe the demand will continue to increase.

“We are on plan to be the largest factory in North America,” King said.