Our Story
It started in a wood shop
Holler Back Calls started the way a lot of good things do — with a kid, a wood shop, and a stubborn belief that a call should be easy to blow. A call is an instrument, and the easier it is to learn, the more people will actually want to pick it up and use it.
I started building calls when I was 15 years old, in my dad's wood shop. I'm 28 now — 29 this August — so this has been more than half my life in the making.
Even back then, I felt like most calls fought you. They took way more air than they should, because of how their pressure was designed. That bugged me enough that I started tearing calls apart and figuring out how to build mine differently — to take little to no air at all. That's still the whole idea behind every call we build today.
What began as a teenager building calls for my own lanyard turned into a brand built on the craft, the camaraderie, and the heritage of waterfowl hunting.
What we believe
We've all blown that call — the one that needs so much air you're red in the face and out of breath before the birds ever commit. We don't build those.
Every Holler Back call is tuned to blow easy and sound real, because the goal was never to be the loudest call in the blind. It was to be the one you reach for first. If your veins are popping, the ducks aren't dropping.
How we build a call
Every call starts as a design I turn and shape by hand — the body, the bore, the mouthpiece, all of it. From there, I bring in other professionals in the industry to program the design and handle manufacturing. As a skilled CNC machinist myself, I work closely with those professionals to make sure every call comes out perfect.
Our illustrations come from ideas across the team and recommendations from our customers. Each call is laser etched with its branded logo, making it easy to pick out different call sounds and shapes at a glance. Every call is hand-painted in combinations we genuinely think our customers will love. And every call gets hand-tuned before it ships, whether it came off the line or off my own bench.
Partnering on manufacturing also lets us produce at scale and keep prices fair, including for the retailers who carry our calls on store shelves. Precision machining gets you a consistent call; the hand work is what makes it sound and look right.
If you want something truly one-of-a-kind, that's where I step back in personally. Our custom, made-to-order calls are designed and hand-built by me from start to finish — no two exactly alike.
This setup lets us focus on what actually matters: keeping the brand authentic, designing new calls, and finding new products that improve your hunt — instead of just chasing volume.
And because no two hunters want the same thing, every call — whether it came off our line or off my bench — is custom color-matched. You pick it, we paint it. That's how a Holler Back call ends up looking like yours and not like everything else on the lanyard.
Meet the crew
Behind every order, Sydnie keeps the whole operation running — inventory, logistics, making sure the right call ships on time and true to what you ordered.
And in the field, our pro staff carries the brand: Adam Hackenmueller and Brady "Bubba" Thompson hunt our calls hard every season and put new designs through their paces before they ever reach you. Geoff Tatur has been with HBC since day one, building our presence at waterfowl conventions and our network across the industry. Devyn McKenzie keeps the crew fed on cold mornings and helps represent HBC at shows.
Want the longer story on everyone? Visit our Meet the Team page.
We stand behind every call
When you buy a Holler Back call, you're not done hearing from us — and we're not done standing behind it.
Every call comes with a lifetime warranty and a free re-tune for life. If it ever stops sounding the way it should, send it back and we'll dial it in. That's not a marketing line. It's the whole point: we want the call you bought from us to be killing birds for as long as you're hunting.
Join the legacy
Most call makers come from a long family lineage — the craft passed down quietly, father to son, inside one bloodline. That's a real tradition, and we respect it.
But that's not the legacy I'm after. I don't want mine to stop with my name or my family — I want it to belong to every hunter who picks up one of my calls. Every Holler Back call you carry into the field is part of that legacy now. The easier I make a call to learn, the more people get to experience that feeling of a bird finally committing — and that's a legacy worth spreading further than one bloodline ever could.
The hunt doesn't end when the birds hit the ground — that's where the stories start. Our Harvest Wall is where the Holler Back crew shares the early wake-ups, the perfect cadences, and the birds that finally committed. Send us yours and become part of it.
We're a small brand out to put our stamp on the waterfowl world, and we'd be proud to have you along as we build it.
Founded in Becker, MN. Built to start a legacy of its own.