Advantage Camo Grizzly Question

[Mike Theis]

A fellow on another site is claiming his Advantage Camo Grizzly is one of a possible two made. He shows as evidence an email from Bear Customer Service stating they have no records of a production run of Advantage Camo Grizzlys. The guy has factory Bear silk screens so they are thinking prototype.  Serial Number on the bow is BG1721.  

I have two Advantage Camo Grizzlys in my possession. I emailed the gentleman and stated same, that I didn't think that they are that rare. My serial numbers are BG1757 & BG1874. This sounds like production run serial #'s to me. I have them because I like to shoot Grizzlys, not necessarily as collectors items.

Does anyone have info on these Advantage Camo Grizzlys? Years produced, size of runs, etc? I am kind of curious now.

[Jack Shanks]

Mike,

 I Emailed the seller as well because there was another factory camo Grizzly listed a few weeks back. I thought it rather strange that both known in existence came up on the auction site a short time apart. Not surprisingly, I didn't hear back from him.

You might try contacting Bear Archery with your question. Be interesting to see if you come up with an entirely different answer on the numbers produced.

[Lucas K]

I think that Bear offered Advantage Camo as an option on all of its bows in the first part of this decade but I don't remember the exact year.

Lucas

[Mike Theis]

Emailed them today. The same customer service rep, Chris answered. Here is his response.

"With all the research that I have done on these the serial numbers do not show up in our records. I do know that they where done in the factory and not done aftermarket by not only by the makings that are on there but by the silk screening that is on them as well. The one problem that I know that we have ran into in the past is there where not a lot of records left behind when we took over. The information that I can get come's from a gentleman who has been in Gainesville since the factory opened. I have picked his brain on every aspect and that is the only two options that he could come up. Was one someone in the factory dipped them for them selves or they where proto types.  Main reason he collects are bow's as well and doesn't ever remember seeing a camo dipped recurve come out of that factory."

So this is interesting, as they clearly have the black Bear silk screens, etc. So maybe a small production run? Or a custom request, which makes it unusual I have two of these. Also interesting that he says not a lot of records were left behind for them to reference. Would have been a shame for the old records to have been destroyed or misplaced somehow and not transferred.

[d. ward]

I would bet those camo grizzly's were built at Bear and the records may be gone maybe they were built after hours who knows but I'am sure they are the real deal Bear Archery built.Rare I don't think so I've seen at least one other cool looking yes   rare naaah bd

[Jack Shanks]

Well, that sounds like good honest answers from Bear to me. For the record I don't believe the other one listed on the auction site brought a lot of money.

[Mike Theis]

Oh yea, I think they were honest. I just think it's a shame they didn't get records of the past when they bought the company. A lot of companies were experimenting with the camo dip process when it came out. Black Widow did, as well as others. It makes for a nice hunting bow, especially for the Grizzly, which is a working mans bow anyway. I like them and doubt that I would part with them.

Just looking for history like everyone else.    

[Whip]

I can kind of understand the lack of records.  When I worked at the bank we were required to keep a lot of records, some for many years.  But as soon as the dates passed that we needed to keep things records were routinely destroyed.  

Keeping records, especially paper records, takes a lot of time, storage space, and for most businesses doesn't create a nickel of income.  It is possible that the records still exist somewhere, but just aren't easily assessible.  The method of storing records has gone from paper to micro fiche, to how many different variations of computer storage.  

At the bank, on those rare occassions when we might have needed to dig back for something it could take a lot of time to find exactly what you were looking for.  For example, if what you are asking about is stored on micro fiche, I'd be willing to bet that the majority of current employees wouldn't even know how to go about looking something up even if it were still in storage.  

It sure would be cool if someone at Bear were able to find the treasure trove of old records.  But even if they did, it could take weeks or months of someones time to put together all of the information that we as people interested in the old stuff would like to find.  And I don't see how they could justify spending the time and money to do that without some way of making it pay for itself.

[d. ward]

I've kept a writen record of bows I've worked on since around 1990.Before that I figured it did not matter and did not record bows I've owned and or worked on before 1990.But looking back on it now those writen records (and or in your pc) but some kind of record is importent ya just never know.I'll bet those Bear Archery records with said Grizzly listed are around somewhere bd

[Mike Theis]

People spend tons of time on genealogy. Isn't this kind of the same thing???     :D

[Twitko]

I know this thread is little bit old, but maybe this info will help somebody ... as I was looking for it for several months ...

Grizzly in Advantage camo  appeared in 1999 catalog. I was told it was in 2000 also, but can't be sure, as I haven't seen this catalog yet ...

BTW my Advantage camo Grizzly is serial BG 1720 (which is quite close to BG-1721 mentioned above) :-)

TW

[MR BILL SHORTY]

Twitko thank you