Duck Commander’s Phil Robertson Shatters One-millionth Duck Call Milestone
OutdoorHub Reporters 11.08.13
On Thursday, Duck Commander founder Phil Robertson assembled the company’s one millionth duck call of the year. It was the first year since the company opened its doors in 1972 that it reached this particular benchmark, and the Robertson family could not be more pleased.
“We were thinking about it, and I’m not sure we’ve even built a million duck calls for the last 35 years,” Phil’s son, Alan Robertson, told KTVE. “Maybe we hit that within the last couple of years, but to be close to that on our whole career building duck calls, and then in one year to be able to pull that off is really just a miracle to make that happen.”
Phil Robertson completed the call—a Classic Commander made of cedar and poplar—at a Duck Commander store in West Monroe, Louisiana. According to the Monroe News Star, a crowd of over one hundred people were in attendance as Robertson finished the call and gave it an inaugural blow.
“Not bad for the one millionth duck call,” Robertson said later.
The call will be auctioned off online to benefit the Northeast Louisiana Veterans Association, which sponsors an all-expense-paid hunting trip for wounded veterans each year.
“For the [men and women] who have sacrificed with their lives and limbs […] the least I can do is try to help out,” Robinson told the Monroe News Star.
Si Robertson, Phil Robertson’s brother and a popular character on A&E’s Duck Dynasty, served for 25 years in the United States Army before retiring in 1993 and joining Duck Commander.
In 2012 Duck Commander reportedly sold 600,000 duck calls, in 2011 the company sold 60,000. When Phil Robertson first founded the company, he sold a mere 2,000.
Robertson said he still remembers the first call he ever made, which he promptly showed to his parents, wife, and two young—at the time—children. After presenting the duck call, Robertson boldly stated that his new company would sell a million dollars worth of them before he was through. According to celebritynetworth.com, the Robertson patriarch now has a net worth of about $15 million. You can hear him speak below at the West Monroe store in the video below:
