The process of making a rod was a lot of fun to me so I began building more rods for friends and families. I enjoyed it so much that I decided in 2016 to start a small rod building business. I created D.D.Lords Custom Rods. I continued to order material from the larger chain store under a wholesale account but still was never quite happy with the cost.

I wanted to make quality rods that the average family person could afford and made the way the buyer wanted it. In 2018 I saw some custom acrylic reel seats that someone had made and really liked the idea so I bought a lathe and began building my own reel seats out of acrylic blanks. This really opened up the different designs I could do with the rods. I spent the next year though looking for a way to make it more cost-effective for the buyer.

I reached out to a lot of manufactures of rod blanks and working with their engineering teams to design a specific taper and action that fit what I had in mind for the best fly rod. Purchased lots of samples, tested a lot of different ideas and spend a lot of time developing what I wanted. Finally last year I found 2 different composite companies one to produce the graphite and one to produce the fiberglass rods. This gave me the ability to produce a rod at a much lower cost. D.D.Lords Custom Rods now didn't seem to fit.

I have fond memories from my youth fishing with my dad, brothers, grandpa and uncle along the small streams of Southeast Idaho. Most of these steams banks are lined with willow bushes. I remember the sounds of the wind blowing through the willow bushes during the summer months and how peaceful that sound is and the images of my dad, brothers, grandpa and uncle standing in the middle of these bushes fishing. It is because of those memories that I chose to change the name to Willow Rods. I enjoy the art of building rods, my goal is to provide quality custom rods and rod blanks at an affordable price.

Doug