Community Highlights: Meet Ed Strickland of Deep River Sporting Clays & Shooting School

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ed Strickland.

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started? 
I am a native of N. C., I was born in Wayne County, and I moved to Cary in the mid-1970s. I grew up in the outdoors, hunting, shooting, and fishing with my grandad and brother. It was something we did all my life from the time I was eight years old. I married my high school sweetheart, Frances, and we have two sons. We have been together for forty-three years. We have four awesome grandkids. 

We ran a family ceramic tile contracting business in Wake County for almost thirty years. 

I never got away from my love of the outdoors, and both of my sons fell in love with outdoor sports and hunted and shot pretty much their entire lives; both still do. 

I decided in 2008, like many others in that time frame it was time for me to make a career change because it just wasn’t fun anymore. I had been a member at Deep River Sporting Clays when the boys were young, and we shot clay targets all the time until they started playing baseball and life just got busy and we didn’t get down there as much. 

In 2010 I reconnected with Bill Kempffer the owner and founder of Deep River Sporting Clays & Shooting School and he convinced me to join the team as an instructor which I did part-time for several years. He asked me to join the company full-time, but at that same time Frances was diagnosed with breast cancer, so we put everything on hold until we got her well, which fortunately we did, and she has been cancer-free for ten years Praise God. I joined Deep River full-time in 2013. 

It was so much fun being there and being able to do work in an environment I truly loved. Bill had begun to make me the face of Deep River as he had started working his way to retirement and in 2019, he and Mary decided to retire and move out of the area. He made me the COO, and I handled the day-to-day operations of the business. At that time not sure what the future held for me or Deep River and I didn’t want another job or boss for that matter, so I pursued buying the business, and in 2020 we took over the business. It has been a blessing to wake up every day and show up to do what I love. 

Our Mission is to Offer Rest, Build Community, and Help Others, and that is what we show up to do every day. 

We use our facility to help many local charities raise awareness and funds for their organization. We support local charities l each quarter through events and contributions from our customers. We also hold annual events for The Boys & Girls Club of Central N.C., The Durham Rescue Mission, The Raleigh Dream Center to name a few, and our signature event each September, Clays4Kay to benefit The Kay Yow Cancer Fund, where we have helped raise over $120,000 in the fight against all women’s cancer. Each October, we throw pink clay targets, and a portion of the profit for each target goes to the Central Carolina Cancer Care Comfort Fund to support patients going through cancer. How our Clays4kay event came about is a pretty cool story in itself. 

I think it’s pretty awesome to use our facility, an outdoor shooting range to offer great outdoor recreation every day to so many in the surrounding areas and at the same time do good for folks in our community. 

I am fortunate to serve on the Sanford Tourism Authority BOD, The Sanford Chamber Advisory BOD, and The Vice Chair of The Boys & Girls Clubs of Central N.C. BOD serving clubs in Sanford, Pittsboro, Siler City, and Lillington. 

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
There were certainly better days than not, but I do believe we learn our best on the rocky path versus the smooth, and I believe in life things don’t happen to you, they happen for you. In 2008 when we closed the contracting business, we had no clue what life was going to look like. When it was all said and done, we lost everything we had worked for over the thirty years, everything, and at fifty years old, starting over from scratch scared was not easy, but we grew in our faith and trusted The Lord to guide us, and He did. Had we not gone down the path in 2008 we would not have been positioned to receive the blessing of where we are today. Going through that inspired Frances to do some soul-searching and decide what she wanted to do at this point in her life. She had seen that if I could find my passion and start a new career at fifty, she could. We discussed it, and I told her to figure out what she thought she would love doing and just go do it and she did. She got her Real Estate license and has been going strong ever since. I do believe we will always have struggles; the key is how you respond to the struggles. 

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
We are an outdoor sporting clays range; we are on 65 acres of land just north of Sanford. Sporting clays is a game played with a shotgun. The concept is to mimic scenarios you would encounter while field hunting, but through the years, it has evolved into a sport and a cool form of recreation. It’s like golf except played with a shotgun. It’s a very safe environment, very family friendly. Some folks refer to it as “Skeet,” but that is a different game/sport. A sporting clays course is made up of 13-14 “fields or shooting positions spread out over the grounds. Our course is around one mile long on a very walkable path. At each field are two trap machines that throw a variety of clay targets in all sorts of directions, from crossing to on the ground like a rabbit. We are in the entertainment business; we just do it with a shotgun. 

We do a lot of corporate and team building events, birthday outings, wedding party events, charity events, you name it, we can host it, and we can tailor it to fit your needs offering everything needed and we can provide services like a variety of catering options. We have a full-service pro Shop with a variety of apparel and gear. We even have a signature candle that smells awesome, we call it “12 gauge and 100-proof”. No, we don’t promote shooting guns and drinking, but it has a rich aroma, and the truth is we couldn’t find anyone who would put gunpowder in a candle for us, then it becomes dynamite (Laughing), but you never forget the smell of gunpowder. 

I think the coolest thing about what we do here is the fact that anyone can do it. Our specialty is new, novice, and beginning shooters, a vast majority of our visitors each day have never fired a gun…ever, but that’s OK, we’re here to help. Anytime anyone is new to our facility, experienced or not, we send one of our staff members around with them to ensure safety and show them the lay of the land and how the game is played. Another cool thing is the families that have made visiting Deep River a family holiday tradition. Thanksgiving week and Christmas week are our busiest times of the year when folks have family in town. But we are open seven days a week, and we only close three days a year, Easter, Thanksgiving & Christmas, other than that, we are open rain, sleet, snow, or hail, if we can get here, you can get here. 

We also offer a shooting school with a fantastic team of experienced Instructors who are certified in both shotgun and handgun disciplines and can’ teach individuals one-on-one at any skill level and help in the selection of the perfect firearm to meet their needs. 

What do you think about happiness?
Happy depends on you, and your attitude. It’s not stuff or wealth; it’s about being thankful for what you have where you are. Did I always practice this? No, but if you live long enough, you will. One of my favorite perspectives that I learned from Doctor James Dobson is that you can work and strive for fame and wealth, bigger this and bigger that, but every now and again, you need to do an end-of-life test, imagine your deathbed, and what you will see is the only thing that mattered in this life were those you loved and those that loved you, that’s it. 

What I love about what I do now is the people because when they come here, they are here to have fun and laugh and spend time with folks they care about, and they come here to get away from all that is pressing on them daily. 

Contact Info:

• Website: deepriversportingclays.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/deepriversportingclays/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100051581502538