Page 56 - Southern Oregon Magazine Summer 2022
P. 56
neck of the woods | in the biz
WHY ARE SAWYER PADDLES AND OARS SO UNIQUE
AND SOUGHT AFTER?
A big question customers are asking: “When is X item going to
be in stock?” The answer is complex, and here’s why…
Sawyer is a manufacturer and not a warehouse. Therefore all their
products require assembly time. Sawyer’s ability to create cream-of-
the-crop, highly desirable, built-to-order customized paddles and oars
is an extra obstacle to navigate in product delivery. One of the most
iconic and specialized products Sawyer produces are oars shaped from
ash and Douglas fir woods. These are carved onsite in Southern Oregon
at their manufacturing facility and headquarters in Talent. Assembly
options for wooden oars like handle styles, blade shape, and rope wrap
specifications all require unique components that must first be in stock
before assembly can occur. Theoretically, if the options selected are in
stock (fingers crossed), then those components will still typically take
several processes to come to completion.
Kauffman explains – “Sawyer walks a line of customization with our
products. Our paddles and oars are handcrafted, not created in mass
like Pez dispensers. Shaping wood, making something by hand along
with other assembly requires artistic nuance. There are many hands
that touch all aspects of our paddles and oars during assembly. Even
something that seems as simple as an MXS-G oar shaft requires a lot
of hands.”
At the moment, fulfillment times on various Sawyer products range
from 2 to 8 weeks. To break this down, it takes 2-4 weeks for your
order to enter the queue. In other words there is a lag time for your
order to be received, read, and put through to the production floor. If
assembly can be done the day it hits the production floor, the process
starts to speed up. If the order is more complex like MXS-G oar shafts
with custom patterns and counter balance, DyneLite PRO Oar Blades,
Gilman Grips and Karmik re-connect gear labels (which must be fiber-
glassed into the item), then the fulfillment process will take longer.
WHERE DID SAWYER’S REPUTATION IN INDUSTRY
LEADERSHIP COME FROM ANYWAY?
In 1967, Ralph Sawyer was a woodworker shaping canoe paddles in
the hamlet of Rogue River. He soon met Willie Illingworth of Willie
Drift Boats who needed someone to craft wood oars for the dories he
was making. According to Kauffman, Ralph was reluctant and Willie
became a real thorn in his side. Fast forward half a century, perhaps
Ralph had a premonition of the fulfillment issues to come. By 1969
Willie had hassled Ralph long enough and Sawyer’s first ever oar model
was underway, the Sawyer Lite, which is still in production today.
Sawyer’s second production facility, in Talent, Oregon, launched in the
80s under the leadership of Bruce Bergstom. He is also responsible
for modern oar designs like the Dynelite Blade, the MX series and
the Polecat series. He brought the company into the future of oars by
experimenting with composite materials and a willingness to integrate
technologies available at the time.
54 www.southernoregonmagazine.com | summer 2022