Fishing rights renegotiation

Goweresque

Member
Location
North Wilts
If the hotel doesn't make anything out the fishing rights, they won't play any more.

They'll make money by selling more rooms, thats point of having the rights, to attract a certain customer who wouldn't come and stay at the hotel otherwise. And probably at times of year when tourists are thinner on the ground. Plus they'll charge the angler the market rate for angling per day.

Its like advertising - the hotel pays for that, and recoups its money by selling more rooms. Having some fishing rights to market isn't something the hotel should be making a profit on in and of themselves, its a marketing cost that they'll break even on over the season.

Imagine a hotel that is located next door to Alton Towers. It might buy tickets to the park and market packages for people to stay at the hotel over night. It pays full whack for the park tickets, and recoups them from the customer plus charges a profitable room rate. It doesn't say to Alton Towers 'Sell us entrance tickets at half price' does it? It might be able to negotiate a bit of a discount for bulk purchases, maybe 10-20% off if it was buying hundreds and hundreds of tickets up front, but it would never get a 50% discount.

The hotel is not the OP's only outlet, he can sell his rights to whoever he likes. He's doing them a favour by offering exclusive rights to them, not the other way around.
 

GreenerGrass

Member
Location
Wilts
Serious pub talk there @Goweresque . Good luck with the negotiation @Jimfandango

As I said previously £450 is probably about the mark. You might want to look up the west country fishing passport scheme, fishpass. Looking about £6/rod a day on the ottery and good luck getting one every day the whole season :rolleyes:

Don't think too many posting on the thread know much about this sort of fishing.
 

Goweresque

Member
Location
North Wilts
I just think that farmers are often walked all over by 'sharp' business people in other business sectors and often give up rights for far less than their true value because they 'don't want to make a fuss', or be seen to be 'greedy', or assume that what they are being offered is a fair price. It often isn't and they are often being taken for a ride.

Because farmers are pretty much always price takers in their farming business lives they often don't realise when they actually hold the whip hand for once, or indeed what values outside the farming bubble are.

The fairest way in this case would be to offer to sell day tickets as required to the hotel. Then no-one need be considered they've been had. If there's no demand then the hotel won't have to buy many, and if there is lots of demand the OP will take all the benefits.
 
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Goweresque

Member
Location
North Wilts
@Goweresque , would you advertise organise bookings and sell tickets for someone else's venture? That's what you're suggesting the hotel does. If the hotel is making a bit as well, they're more likely to push it.

Yes if it meant that my core business benefited! What does the hotel want to do? Sell as many hotel rooms as possible. How does it do that? By spending money marketing itself. Having a USP like private fishing rights is a marketing tool, and as such will cost money, not make you profits in and of itself. You don't expect a magazine to pay half the cost of your advert do you? You pay the full rate and hope that trade increases enough to pay for the advert and some more.
 
Location
southwest
At present the OP is getting an income from the fishing rights for zero outlay or effort, whilst the hotel is getting a benefit in the form of a unknown number of extra bookings.

If OP pushes it too much, the Hotel may decide the benefits of the deal are not worth their effort and redirect their marketing in other directions. Cornwall has (unfortunately for locals) many attractions other than fishing and there are a couple of Hotels in the area with a lot better fishing as part of their USP.

We'll agree to differ.
 

Dr. Alkathene

Member
Livestock Farmer
Ring your local fishing clubs and see if any of them are interested in leasing the stretch. That gives you a potential base figure to work from with the hotel and a potential plan B and C if the hotel try and have your pants down.
 
Thanks for all of your input. It make a for pretty interesting reading. I am currently trying to contact a couple of agency types like rods on rivers, and fish pass to see what they say about it. And gauge interest and impression of the standard of fishing. You are correct betweenthelines, currently I am making annually £450 for zero outlay. At the minute my guess would be that we only see around 15 - 25 fishermen a year walking about. This would make it a pretty good income/head assuming that it was all being advertised properly. Poor management/lack of drive might be a reason for the hotel sale in the first place.
My gut feeling is that £450 is around the right mark but maybe I could either say I will advertise elsewhere or ask for a bit on top for exclusivity.
Besides the more fishermen wandering the river banks the more rangerovers and Lexus parked in front on my gates.
 

steveR

Member
Mixed Farmer
One of the things I like about NZ, no one owns the rivers or the rights. $100 or so for a yearly licence and off you go, subject to catch limits and legal methods of course.

It means fishing isn't just for those with loads of money and is often more about catching a feed than just the sport.
Hunting isn't about who has the most money either.
I suppose it wouldn't work in the UK.

Apologies to he OP, no help, just rambling. :oops:

Slightly different levels of population pressure on the resources though I suspect between Kiwi-land and Blighty....??
 

Exfarmer

Member
Location
Bury St Edmunds
Thanks for all of your input. It make a for pretty interesting reading. I am currently trying to contact a couple of agency types like rods on rivers, and fish pass to see what they say about it. And gauge interest and impression of the standard of fishing. You are correct betweenthelines, currently I am making annually £450 for zero outlay. At the minute my guess would be that we only see around 15 - 25 fishermen a year walking about. This would make it a pretty good income/head assuming that it was all being advertised properly. Poor management/lack of drive might be a reason for the hotel sale in the first place.
My gut feeling is that £450 is around the right mark but maybe I could either say I will advertise elsewhere or ask for a bit on top for exclusivity.
Besides the more fishermen wandering the river banks the more rangerovers and Lexus parked in front on my gates.
If Ilived next to you, I would take your hand off for a chance of a Mile of fishing at that money. I think I would start at £2,000 . For a hotel I would have thought that must be worth a minimum of £5K
 

GreenerGrass

Member
Location
Wilts
I obviously don't know the river, but I do know a little about fishermen. I certainly would pay a couple of grand for the chance of a bit of peace and quiet on the bank. provided I could get to it for a start.
Yes but you are in Suffolk and this river is in Devon they are not really that comparable.
 
I'd say to the hotel that the deal was with the former owners and set top at a time when that figure suited . id be after a figure that is around 6 times the original amount for that sort of length and rights.
 

PSQ

Member
Arable Farmer
A bit late to this thread, but I’d suggest you find an agent with expertise in fishing.
I sold my late fathers fishing syndicate share in 2008 and used a chap from Savills, who was absolutely fantastic. It ended up going to sealed bids, and exceeded the expected guide price by a staggering margin.
Without expert advice I wouldn’t have achieved anywhere near the final price, the agent was worth every penny of his commission.
 

Steevo

Member
Location
Gloucestershire
A bit late to this thread, but I’d suggest you find an agent with expertise in fishing.
I sold my late fathers fishing syndicate share in 2008 and used a chap from Savills, who was absolutely fantastic. It ended up going to sealed bids, and exceeded the expected guide price by a staggering margin.
Without expert advice I wouldn’t have achieved anywhere near the final price, the agent was worth every penny of his commission.

This is often the case with many things. Existing agreements roll on and aren’t brought to the market to achieve their full value, so neither exiting party are aware of their true worth.

Sounds like an excellent outcome in your case.
 

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