You might have noticed that many Whitetail News articles end with a statement like, “For more information,” or “To speak with a consultant, call the Whitetail Institute’s in-house consultants at (800) 688-3030.” If you’ve wanted to put a face with the voice on the other end of the consultant line, this article will introduce the Institute’s friendly and knowledgeable in-house consultant staff.
JOHN WHITE:Any introduction of the Institute’s in-house consulting staff has to begin with its leader, John White, the Whitetail Institute’s national in-house consulting and sales director. White has been with the Institute longer than any other consultant, having joined the Institute in 1990 only two years after its founding by Ray Scott.
During the past 20 years, White has helped Whitetail Institute customers with almost any question or situation that one can imagine. John also manages large tracts of land for local landowners near his home, which he considers an important source of his extensive practical knowledge. With all that, you can understand why White is definitely the go-to guy when other consultants are trying to assist customers with highly complex or unusual questions and situations.
In addition to directly helping callers, White also manages the dayto-day operations of the consulting staff, administers the in-house sales division, and performs many other duties that are continually added to his plate because of his wealth of experience.
JOHN FRANK DEESE: Wildlife biologist, John Frank Deese holds a degree in wildlife sciences from Auburn University. Before joining the Whitetail Institute, Deese managed properties for private landowners. He is one of the most knowledgeable consultants on staff.
During the years Deese managed properties, he added substantial practical knowledge to what he had learned in college. He's highly experienced in a wide range of land-management matters, including food plot systems, planting and maintaining food plots and conducting controlled burns. In addition, Deese is also highly knowledgeable about fruit and mast trees, having maintained close contact with his family’s tree nursery business throughout his life.
As you can probably guess, customers who turn to Deese for assistance often remark that Deese is extremely knowledgeable. It’s no surprise that his academic credentials and broad practical experience have proved to be a superb platform for his consulting work for the Institute. When it comes to putting knowledge and experience to work helping hunters and managers, you’ll find no one more eager than Deese.
Justin Moore is the Institute’s wildlife biologist, having graduated from college with a degree in wildlife biology before joining the Whitetail Institute in 2007. In addition to his academic credentials, Moore has an immense base of practical knowledge he developed during a lifetime of hunting and land management. Perhaps Moore’s biggest asset when it comes to helping customers is his strong commitment to stewardship. In fact, everyone at the Whitetail Institute is pretty hard-core when it comes to stewardship, but perhaps no one at the Institute developed such a strong drive toward it at such an early age.
When asked what planted in him the drive to pursue a career in conservation, Moore points to his father, who took him hunting when Moore was very young, and then kept taking him regularly as he grew up. Moore says that all through his early life, and especially on those hunts, his father took the time to talk to Moore and tell him that conservation is a duty each of us owes to the world and future generations. One thing you’ll notice about Moore is that he always has a smile on his face. He attributes this in large part to working with the Institute, which gives him the perfect avenue to fulfill his stewardship duty by helping other hunters and managers.
BRANDON SELF: When it comes to handson experience with deer and food plots, no one has more than Self. In fact, you’ll only find him in his office at the Institute when it’s not deer season. During fall and winter, he’s elsewhere, usually planting food plots, setting up stands and, of course, hunting. In fact, Self has so much practical experience that the only way the Institute could lure him onto the consulting staff was to make a special position only during spring and summer.
Perhaps no other in-house consultant has developed more long-term, one-on-one relationships with specific Whitetail Institute customers than Self. Reasons include his energy and knowledge, but the biggest seems to be his skill in helping customers solve real-world issues that hunters and managers face in designing food plots, food plot systems, and selecting, planting and maintaining forages.
JON COONER: As the Institute’s director of special projects, Cooner has his hands in a broad range of activities, from writing articles to helping customers as an in-house consultant. Of all the things he does at the Institute, Cooner believes that his direct contact with customers is the most important for several reasons.
The main reason, again, is the Institute’s philosophy that customer service should be knowledgeable and timely. Cooner believes that the opportunity to answer customers’ questions and help them solve issues they face in their management efforts helps keep him up-todate on practical management issues that affect hunters regionally and across the nation.
As you can see, the Institute’s consulting staff is diverse, yet they have several things in common. For example, they are all hunters, and they have substantial knowledge and experience in a broad range of matters that pertain to deer, deer hunting and land management. But what sets the Institute’s consulting staff apart is more than just knowledge and experience. It’s also that each and every whitetail consultant loves his work, and that joy comes from a sense of excitement each consultant feels about having a job he considers an absolute pleasure — helping other hunters and managers.
The source of this drive to truly help customers is best described by Ray Scott when he explains the Whitetail Institute’s customer service philosophy.
“Building a healthy business requires extreme dedication to two things: product quality and customer service. Providing truly top-quality customer service takes a lot of work. When a customer calls, you can’t just consider that your job is to answer a question. You have to consider that you’re building a relationship with that customer as a person. And after all, that’s only fair; he’s giving his business to you, and you owe it to him to give him the highest quality product you can and then give him timely, useful customer service support.”
It seems to be the norm these days that most companies’ customer-service departments are just computers that try to solve problems by asking a series of questions that you answer by pushing a number on your telephone. Well, that just doesn’t cut it for the staff at the Whitetail Institute. We don’t ask questions by pushing telephone buttons, and we don’t like to have them answered that way.
When you call the Whitetail Institute’s consultant extension during business hours, though, you find some surprises — nice surprises. For instance, you’ll find that the consultant extension is answered by a real person — and what’s more, that person is knowledgeable, experienced and truly interested in helping you. You’ll also find that the consultant extension is almost always answered right away.
The Institute is very strict about answering the phone quickly. It's so strict, in fact, that I’ll let you in on a secret: Every office at the Institute has a strobe light mounted on the wall — yes, every office, owners and staff. If the consultant line rings more than twice during business hours without being answered, the strobe light in every office automatically goes off, and everyone dives to answer the phone.
Folks, customer service just doesn’t get any more dedicated to timely response than that. There’s a reason why the Institute is so driven to provide its customers with service that is timely, knowledgeable and personal. It all goes back to what Scott said about relationships. The Institute builds relationships with its customers, and nowhere is that more true than with the one-on-one contact customers have with the Institute’s consultants. In fact, many customers have a direct, long-term business relationship with a particular consultant, whom they call year after year for information and ordering. And after that, here’s the really amazing thing: When you call and speak with a Whitetail Institute consultant, the call and the service are free. As I mentioned at the start of this article, and as many other Whitetail News articles end, “If you have any questions or need additional information call the Whitetail Institute at (800) 688-3030.”
