I am a staunch supporter of my local fly shop (Sportsman's Finest) and I spend at least $50/month there but you will never convince me to spend my limited budget for fly tying materials on a $4 twenty pack of 3D Eyes when I can buy 1,120 3D Eyes off of Amazon for $19 (1/10th the cost on a per unit basis). Here are five massive cost saving alternatives to some of my favorite fly tying materials:
5. EVA Foam
Possibly my favorite fly tying material: EVA Foam is great for every level of tying flies. Have you ever looked at the specialty foam for sale in your local fly shop and noticed that a 4.5" by 5.5" sheet is selling for $4-$8?!? All you need to do is drive over to Hobby Lobby, Walmart, or Michaels and you can purchase an entire 12" by 18" sheet of foam for less than $2 and in any primary color you want. Now, to play devil's advocate, the foam you purchase from a fly tying brand will always be high quality as well as more durable and more buoyant than the less expensive big brand foam sheets. A good example of this is Upavon's Double Decker Foam which I use for several different patterns and it is my favorite fly tying brand foam (see video comparison below).
A Few Of My Foam Flies
There is no wrong choice, but if I have to choose between spending $20 on a few small cuts of specialty foam or spending $20 and having enough EVA foam to last for a few years of heavy tying, I will opt for having an abundance every time.
4. Craft Fur
This may be more controversial than my take on EVA foam but I stand by it! Rather than spend $4.75 on a 3" x 5" pack of premium (15 square inches at $4.75 = $.31/sqin) Craft Fur, go to Hobby Lobby and spend $2.99 for 9" x 12" (108 square inches at $2.99 = $.02/sqin). You will run into the same compromise as I mentioned with EVA Foam:
The fly tying brands have longer and better Craft Fur but unless you are tying flies for Fly Tyer Magazine, go and save your money to grab an entire pelt of Long Pile Faux Fur. You will have enough material to last several years instead of just several flies. As the numbers state above, you will be paying less than 1/10th the cost for the off brand Craft Fur on a $/square inch basis.
3. Super Glue
Here is another disputed claim: Don't over-pay for Head Cement or Zap A Gap, just buy the Loctite brand super glue and use the saved money to buy more tying materials. One of the first things I noticed as a novice fly tyer back in 2015 was how much more expensive the special glues for tying flies were compared to generic super glue. A small bottle of Loctite costs roughly $3 on Amazon and will keep your ties locked down just as well as the $5 Zap A Gap or $6 Head Cement bottle. I will say that there are a few scenarios where the viscosity of the Zap A Gap is a plus because it can penetrate materials better than Loctite glue can but I still prefer the savings in dinero. Side note, I do think it is worth paying for expensive resin like the UV Clear Fly Finish from Loon Outdoors, but that is another article.
2. UV Flash Light
There are so many UV light options that I am surprised at how few fly tying enthusiasts buy off brand Amazon products for this tool. Sure, the rechargeable UV Infiniti Light from Loon Outdoors is beautifully designed, has 149+ five star reviews, and everyone I have spoken to who uses it, absolutely loves it. BUT, it costs $65. I bought two MOLAER pen UV lights (pictured above) for $14 or $7 each off of Amazon and they are more than sufficient for curing my UV resin patterns. I have owned and used five different off brand UV lights and the two smallest and least expensive happen to have been my favorites.
1. 3D Eyes
This is the material I am most convicted about and it is the reason why I wrote this blog post. Back when my budget for fly tying was I can either buy groceries or tie flies, I made a conscious decision never to use 3D Eyes because they were always $5-$10 for 10 - 20 eyes! Thats only 5 -10 flies before you run out of eyes to use. Even worse, what if you are a beginner and botch the first few practice patterns only to waste your precious finite number of 3D eyes and then you only have three to four pairs of eyes left for a more polished pattern that you feel good about. Behold, the 3D Eyes from Amazon (shipped from Ohio). Never be hesitant to throw a pair of eyes on a fly again with the $19.05 - 1,120 pack of 4mm 3D eyes. Are these eyes simple and not as sexy as some of the higher quality eyes from fly tying brands? Yes, but they also are less than 1/10th the cost.
Cost Per Eye Breakdown:
My favorite high quality eyes (Volcanic Dragon Eyes from Surface Seducer) cost $4.45 for 20 4mm eyes. This comes out to 22 cents per eye which doesn't seem like much until you compare the unit price to the 3D Eyes from Amazon (pictured top right) which come in at just under 2 cents per eye.
Conclusion
There are no true solutions, only compromises. You can either choose to spend less money for a large quantity of "lower quality" products or you can pay almost 10x as much to have a considerably smaller quantity of the higher quality materials. As it happens, I own and use both the expensive and more affordable options for each one of these items but the reason I wrote this article was to share the more affordable materials and tools that I are worth saving money on. Just a heads up, *the hyperlinks that take you to the Amazon products are my affiliate marketing links and I will receive a small commission if you purchase them*.
Comments