Lanka Fishing Flies Ltd

What Sri Lankan company provides 90 percent of the fishing flies sold in the United States? Ever hear of Lanka Fishing Flies Ltd? Perhaps you know them under the brand they export to the United States under, Umpqua. The National Newspaper of Sri Lanka has an interesting profile of the company which also is the sole North American distributor for Tiemco hooks.

“Fly-fishing,” is a popular sport in the United States and we supply 90 per cent of artificial fishing flies to the USA market,” its Managing Director Suresh de Mel told Daily News Business.

Apparently all those flies we leave hanging in the trees make for big business:

De Mel said he has three factories with a workforce of 300 employees and exports more than half a million fishing flies to the USA. Therefore, the company’s annual revenue is US $ one million per year.

Doesn't that work out to $2 a fly wholesale? Hmmmmm....