Helen Sevier
Lady B.A.S.S.

Thursday, October 30, 2008
by Ray Scott

I grew up with female entrepreneurs – namely my grandmother and my mother – who in exceedingly hard times successfully operated their own small businesses. They tucked away money and were financially independent in their retirement years as widows .

As they say, these ladies were both go-getters and had plenty of moxie.

So I was – and am – gender blind when it comes to talent. Even in a male-dominated sport like bass fishing.

Photo: BASS Helen Sevier was hired as vice president of marketing of B.A.S.S. in 1970 and later became CEO. Her marketing genius would help grow B.A.S.S. into the world’s largest sport-fishing organization.

Her name is Helen Sevier and she served as vice president of marketing of B.A.S.S. until I sold the company to her and other employees in l986. I stayed on as president for another 10-plus years. She and other investors sold the company to ESPN in 2001.

Like myself, retirement isn’t in Helen’s vocabulary. She still resides in Montgomery, Ala. and is an active businesswoman and entrepreneur, among other things publishing several outstanding magazines.

Helen came on board in l970 shortly after Bob Cobb became my VP of communications and the renowned editor of Bassmaster Magazine and later, creator of The Bassmasters TV show. She may not have been there at the very infancy of B.A.S.S. in 1968, but I must share this 40th anniversary year with her. Along with Bob Cobb and tournament master Harold Sharp, no one had more to do with the amazing success of the phenomenon called the Bass Anglers Sportsman Society or B.A.S.S.

Helen and I were total opposites in so many ways, but had a synergy that worked amazingly well together. We were like a battery that produces energy between a negative and a positive charge. I had wild ideas. She figured out how to implement them. I was impatient. She was calm. I ruffled feathers. She smoothed them. You get the picture.

One of my favorite founding stories of B.A.S.S. is how I met Helen. Not surprisingly, it was a story of seeking out my opposite.

I had been trying to make direct mail work for me in acquiring more members. I was getting great results from my prospecting campaign, i.e. getting members to recommend other members. But it wasn’t fast enough for me. Before the days of the Internet, direct mail was a terrifically successful way of marketing if done properly. If not, it was lots of money down the drain.

To make it work profitably, you had to figure “break-evens” and I couldn’t spell the word. I needed someone who could.

And so it happened I heard about one young and bright lady named Helen Sevier.

She was in Montgomery, working wonders for now famous Civil Rights attorney Morris Dees, who was at the time making his fortune in a marketing company called Fuller & Dees that relied on direct mail for its success.

Morris was a casual friend who graciously helped me in the early stages of B.A.S.S. We both came from modest backgrounds in Montgomery, and were hustling our way up in our careers. In l969 I was consulting with him on reprinting a vintage book called The Book of the Black Bass to use as a premium for new and renewing members.

Cobb and I were visiting in his office and I asked him the $64 question – how do you figure break-evens on direct mail. He kind of shrugged his shoulders and said he didn’t rightly know, but he had a sharp gal down the hall who did. He said he could introduce me one day. I said how about now.

You guessed it – it was Helen Sevier.

I’ll never forget our first meeting. She looked up from her desk with a big smile. She was a slim brunette with a modest air and plenty of smarts. A Mississippi girl, she had a masters defree in marketing (on a scholarship) from the University of Alabama. She was clearly intrigued by my membership organization and yes, she could figure break-evens on direct mail.

She came on board in l970 – just a few months after our first meeting. Like Cobb, she accepted less money than in her previous job. Within a year after she came to B.A.S.S., membership jumped from l5,000 to 25,000 and then to 65,000 the following year. After that we stopped counting and just kept our noses to the grindstone. Membership soared to over 500,000 under her marketing strategies. When she sold to ESPN, membership was over 600,000.

Thanks to her, I was free to do what I did best – be the P.R. man and promote the organization. Best of all, I was able to run down all the crazy, unmarked trails of an exciting new business. Together Helen, Bob, Harold and I opened up vast new horizons that would grow into a multi-billion dollar industry that benefited so many.

More than anything, she fully understood and embraced the passion of our membership – and of the whole bass fishing world. To my everlasting gratitude, under her stewardship she fully supported – and continued and expanded – my conservation, environmental and youth fishing efforts (and even fights) and shared the belief that some things don’t make money; they’re just the right thing to do.

To this day, that is the lasting legacy of B.A.S.S. And I am proud to share it with an amazing woman named Helen Sevier.

To read more about the inspiring story of Ray Scott and the multi-billion-dollar sportfishing industry he created, order Robert Boyle's 368-page biography, Bass Boss, at www.RayScott.net, or call (800) 518-7222.