Bass Pro Shops & Cabela's Case Study

Bass Pro Shops and Cabela's are two of America's largest outdoor retailers, generating multi-billions in annual revenue. As Email Marketing Manager, I owned the full lifecycle program across email, SMS, and push — reporting directly to the CMO and CDO, managing a ~$5M annual marketing budget, and leading a team of four. Programs reached millions of subscribers and deployed billions of emails annually across both brands simultaneously.

When I joined Bass Pro Shops as an individual contributor in 2017, there was a significant opportunity to modernize and grow the email program. Templates across transactional emails, e-receipts, and site correspondence hadn't been updated in years, personalization infrastructure was minimal, and segmentation was limited. There was a lot of runway.

In 2018, the Cabela's acquisition created an opportunity to build something bigger — merging two enterprise email programs into one unified, high-performing operation. I inherited the Cabela's program mid-transition with minimal handoff, which meant working through data gaps and migrating assets to Cheetah Digital while keeping both brands running without interruption. When I was promoted to manager of both programs in 2019, the real build began.

The first priority was modernization — rebuilding every major customer touchpoint from the ground up across both brands. Working closely with product managers and graphic designers, my team and I rebuilt and relaunched the full lifecycle program including:

• Welcome series
• Abandoned cart
• Browse abandonment
• Rating & review request
• Transactional emails
• Automated e-receipts
• Automated e-gift cards
• Re-engagement
• Site correspondence emails (password reset, my account, and more)

Every rebuild included updated design, API integrations, and system overhauls for both Bass Pro Shops and Cabela's — 70+ tailored automated flows in total.

To drive list growth, I implemented strategic sign-up forms and pop-ups that meaningfully expanded the email file for both brands. I built and ran a systematic A/B testing framework across flows and campaigns, using what we learned to develop a fully optimized email template system for both brands. The cumulative impact of those tests is what drove the CTR improvements we saw across Bass Pro Shops and Cabela's.

The biggest revenue unlock came with the launch of Bluecore on Bass Pro Shops — bringing AI-powered product recommendations and individualized dynamic content into the program at scale. Bluecore already existed on Cabela's; duplicating and rewriting it for Bass Pro was a major lift, but the revenue impact was immediate and significant. Combined with Liveclicker for real-time personalization at time-of-open, the program went from largely batch-and-blast to genuinely personalized at scale.

I also launched the Bass Pro Shops SMS program from scratch and led two full ESP migrations without disrupting performance on either brand.

In 2019, I was challenged to find efficiencies in program spending. Rather than cut services, I worked directly with procurement to renegotiate vendor contracts — preserving every capability while delivering $423K in savings. The program got leaner without losing anything.

As the broader marketing program adapted during the pandemic in 2020, I shifted the email program to pure behavioral automation — trigger-based emails driven entirely by what customers were actually doing on site. With outdoor gear in high demand and customers spending more time at home, the behavioral program kept driving consistent revenue through one of the most unpredictable periods in retail history.

By 2020, the program had been fully transformed — a modernized, personalized, behaviorally-driven lifecycle engine running seamlessly across two of America's most iconic outdoor brands.

• 200% increase in email revenue year-over-year
• Triggered email revenue grew 3.5x
• Email list grew 35%
• 33% lift in overall CTR for Bass Pro Shops — driven by a systematic A/B testing framework and fully optimized email template system
• 17% lift in overall CTR for Cabela's — same framework applied across both brands
• 95% increase in website ratings and reviews following the Rating & Review Request flow relaunch
• $423K in contract and vendor savings negotiated while maintaining all existing services and capabilities

What started as an individual contributor role became one of the most comprehensive lifecycle marketing programs I've ever built. From modernizing decade-old templates to navigating an acquisition, building a team, and pivoting through a pandemic — every challenge made the program stronger. If you're looking for someone who has seen what enterprise lifecycle marketing looks like at its most complex and come out the other side with results, I'd love to talk.