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Last Updated: Dec 12, 2008 - 4:54:39 PM |
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Brandon Vileta and Joe Loftus set manufactured eyes into a deer mannequin, one of the many steps of preparation in reaching the finished product in taxidermy. Laura Timm Photo
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Remember thirteen? Big dreams, the time to embellish them and the blind optimism to believe you can accomplish them. If you are a young boy, it doesn’t matter where you live; at thirteen, you’ve probably got a dream of your own. That’s how old Iowa Valley graduates, Brandon Vileta and Joe Loftus Jr. were when they first dreamed up the company that is now Honey Creek Outdoors/Taxidermy. Vileta, with the help of his family, founded the company in 2007 and in the last year, the two have connected with some heavy hitters in the outdoor sporting industry.
Vileta and Loftus are now dealers for companies like Kinsey’s Archery Products Inc., and through HCO, offer hunting, archery, muzzle loading and trapping supplies as well as footwear, apparel, backpacks and even food products.
Over the last year Vileta has also developed other businesses to coordinate with HCO including: Taxidermy and Custom Archery Shop, which offers a service to equip the bow so that it is complete and ready to use for the season; Honey Creek Outdoors and Guide Service, which specializes in fully guided youth hunts with video coverage, offers proficiency training and testing prior to the excursion and a provides a disk (after processing) of the filmed experience to the youth; and Honey Creek Concepts, a new business in the works, that will feature inventions of both Brandon Vileta and his father Bob Vileta. In the last year, Brandon has created a new type of camera arm (allows an outdoorsman to film his own hunts) which can be viewed on the company’s web site, www.honeycreekoutdoors.com.
Vileta and Loftus, along with friends and fellow Iowa Valley graduates of 2007, Ben Cronbaugh and Greg Ryan, have recently teamed up with Illusion LLC-Game Call Systems as a part of their Pro Staff Team. Things just seem to keep getting better and the doors are still opening for Vileta and Loftus - but it wasn’t exactly an overnight process.
When Vileta was a boy, even before his first day out hunting at around age ten, his father, local taxidermist, Bob Vileta, instilled in his son a level of honor for all living things and a deep respect for the balance required in nature. Bob, who’s own father had raised deer and elk along with other exotic animals, shared with his son the memories of countless hunting adventures that he and a friend had experienced while growing up. The father began to hand down the hard earned knowledge and passion for wildlife management that he’d gained over the years to his son.
Brandon arrowed his first deer with a bow at age eleven, a trophy buck scoring out at 150 Pope and Young. As time passed Vileta began to look around for someone his age who felt the way he did about the sport, from understanding wildlife to respecting everything outdoors.
Elsewhere in Iowa County, High School Teacher Joe Loftus Sr., had begun taking his son, Joe Jr., out on rabbit and pheasant hunts. A love for the sport came naturally to Joe Jr. as the two spent time together outdoors. When Vileta and Loftus were twelve they started talking about hunting one day at school and the dream ignited.
What makes these boys different is that the dream kept getting stronger.
Vileta recalls, “We’d get onto online forums and talk about our experiences and our ideas with other adult outdoorsmen. We bounced our ideas off of them, told them our company name idea and asked for feedback and we got a lot of encouragement. Then, sometimes, people would figure out our ages and that we were only in junior high and tell us we couldn’t do that.”
Most kids would get knocked down a peg or two at this point but these boys considered it a compliment and pressed on. Brandon’s mom, Lisa, remembers coming out of the house to see that the thirteen-year-old boys had written their first idea for a company name on the sides of her new Blazer. Later, someone else used the boys name idea as the title of a hunting show that still runs on TV.
The ideas began to take shape. Brandon’s father bought some land near Honey Creek in Belle Plaine, prime ground for hunting and a world of exploration for two boys. The optimism and the excitement in their stories began to draw other boys like bees to honey.
Vileta and Loftus invited other friends to join on the excursions and caught the whole thing on tape, including the look on the face of a friend when he finally got the deer they’d been tracking. Soon other boys like Cronbaugh and Ryan were showing up on the filmed excursions and obviously having the time of their lives. Some of these memories are included on the company’s web site as well as on their marketing CD.
Vileta and Loftus loved the experience of teaching others and decided it was time to bring their younger siblings into the picture. Brandon’s sister, Mandi and Joe’s brother, Logan were the first new youth to be featured in the films. As the older outdoorsmen gave instructions to the new recruits things went… mostly well. The boys made sure the younger two had the pleasure of experiencing some of the hard work and a few of the less enjoyable lessons needed to be successful. Mandi recalled a time when Brandon instructed her to belly crawl for a half mile during a hunt.
After graduation, Brandon began working for his father’s taxidermy business while taking college classes online. It wasn’t long before Loftus started working for Bob’s Taxidermy as well. For the last year the two have helped with the prep work at the shop and learned, under Bob’s supervision, first one skill in the trade and then another. Now, after years of watching and helping in graduated steps, Brandon and Joe are quickly becoming qualified in the art of taxidermy themselves.
The family recently acquired a fawn, Angel, and the legal license to keep her. When asked about the irony of caring for a fawn, which won’t be released or hunted, while maintaining a hunting lifestyle and a taxidermy business, Lisa and several members of the family tried to explain a principal of respect, “People don’t always understand the respect involved between an outdoorsman and nature. Angel is very special to the family as well as to HCO and is an important subject of study for the taxidermy business.”
Regarding the term ‘hunter’, Bob replied, “I really prefer the term outdoorsman. Hunting is just one part of it and the term hunter doesn’t really define everything a true outdoorsman does. We enjoy watching it not just hunting it. We plant food plots for the animals and make sure the fence rows have some habitat for pheasants, quail, deer, turkeys and more.” The HCO website also states the company’s dedication to stewardship of the land with a focus on managing the deer and buck ratio and the health of the population.
At nineteen years old, Brandon Vileta and Joe Loftus are living their dream. Brandon, as founder of HCO, actively contributes to every aspect of the company. Loftus, along with Vileta brings a strong commitment and insight to the continued success of the company.
The entire Vileta family, owners of HCO and its coordinating businesses, contribute more than a monetary investment to the company. Sister, Mandi, now helps with all taxidermy preparations for ducks, geese and various birds that come in; Mom, Lisa, HCO’s Coordinator, runs the show on paper and handles all licensing aspects of the business and Dad, Bob, contributes his twenty years of experience as a licensed and respected taxidermist while continuing to pass down these skills to Brandon, Joe and Mandi.
The outdoor sporting company first envisioned by a couple of thirteen year olds is finally real and is becoming so much more than the boys had first been capable of dreaming. It’s a close network of friends and family actively contributing - and watching - as the dream just keeps growing.
© Copyright 2008 by The East Iowa Herald
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Skies: CloudyTemperature: 25F -4CDewpoint: 19F -7CRelative Humidity: 78%Wind: SE at 7m - 11kBarometric Pressure: 29.63FUpdated: 12:53:27 PM