For a couple years now Basin Sports has been doing a month-long promotional deal with Vortex Optics. Vortex Days reminds me of the first time I heard of them. It was about thirteen or fourteen years ago. At that time, as I recall, there were only a few different pairs of binoculars, two lines of rifle scopes and a couple spotting scopes.
We didn’t bring in too much starting out. There were a lot of other companies with larger catalogs of optics vying for shelf space. But Vortex brought something else with them. They had a warranty that didn’t require registering with them and covered things that had nothing to do with “parts and workmanship.” If you dropped your binos, they took care of you. A lot of folks see a company launch with that kind of service and expect it to change when they get their piece of the market carved out. Not Vortex. As they have grown from a few scopes and a few binos into one of the biggest names in sport optics, they have never backed away from their desire to put their products in your hands and keep them there.
As far as the warranty goes, I’ve seen spotting scopes that a pack horse rolled over or that fell out of a truck onto the highway at speed. I’ve seen binos that were lost in the desert and found after a couple years. I’ve seen these optics get sent back and come back repaired or replaced. We swapped out a broken spotting scope over the counter on the second day of the hunt and vortex sent us a replacement so our customer didn’t have to go without.
Because Vortex has worked to take care of their customers to such an awesome level, they have grown to occupy a fair amount of shelf space. They have optics in about every price-point and are very easy to work with if we don’t have it on hand.
I started out with a Diamondback 4-12 on a 17HMR and have since put Vipers and Strike Eagles on some of my long range precision rifles. There’s a pair of Vortex binos that ride around in the truck with me all the time.
It has been interesting to watch them grow in the sport optic market over the years. They started small with a fairly personal touch to customer service. As big as they are now, they still do everything they can to make sure every customer is taken care of.
Ben Thompson
Basin Sports
