Discount Flies

For more than 25 years, DiscountFlies has built its business around a simple idea: anglers should not have to choose between quality fishing flies and an affordable price.

The family-run company has been selling flies since 1999, growing from an online source for anglers into a business whose products are now carried by more than 200 brick-and-mortar fly shops and purchased by guides and lodges.

The name DiscountFlies reflects the company's approach to pricing, but not to quality. The company imports its flies directly and works with skilled fly tyers using materials from established names in the industry, including Whiting Farms, Wapsi and Hareline, along with hooks from Gamakatsu, Tiemco, Ahrex, Hanak and Daiichi.

That commitment to quality has remained at the center of the business as DiscountFlies has grown. Behind every order is a network of tyers creating the products, a large assortment of patterns and sizes to manage, fishing professionals relying on that inventory, and anglers waiting to put those flies to work on the water.

A Fly-Fishing Business More Than 25 Years in the Making

DiscountFlies began in 1999, long before buying fishing flies online was as commonplace as it is today. What started as a way to give anglers access to quality flies at better prices grew over the years into a business serving customers across the country. More than two decades later, the business entered a new chapter.

In 2021, Chris Nielsen and his family took over DiscountFlies. They were not simply buying an ecommerce company. Fly fishing was already part of their lives, giving them a personal connection to the products, the customers and the community the business had spent years serving.

The Nielsen family inherited more than a website and an inventory of flies. They were taking responsibility for a business that had already spent more than 20 years building relationships with anglers and earning a reputation around the quality and value of its products.

Since then, they have continued building on that foundation rather than trying to reinvent it. DiscountFlies still operates around the idea it began with in 1999: make well-tied, dependable flies accessible to anglers at prices that make it easier to keep a fly box stocked.

Today, those flies are shipped directly to anglers, stocked in fly shops, and purchased by guides and lodges whose own customers may eventually cast one onto the water. Behind each one is a business that has changed hands, grown and evolved over more than a quarter century while remaining closely connected to the people who fish with what it sells.

The Craft Behind the Flies

To someone outside of fly fishing, the differences between two fishing flies can seem remarkably small. To an angler, those differences are the point.

Flies are designed to imitate the insects, baitfish and other food fish encountered in the water. Pattern, size, shape and materials can all change depending on the species being targeted and the conditions an angler expects to find.

DiscountFlies carries everything from dry flies and nymphs to streamers, bass flies, saltwater flies and patterns designed for particular species and situations. Even a familiar pattern may be available in several sizes.

Producing that variety while maintaining quality starts with the people tying the flies. DiscountFlies pays its tyers premium rates for the additional time required to produce durable, high-quality flies and offers incentives for consistently good work. The company also emphasizes the materials that go into each pattern, choosing established manufacturers rather than reducing quality to reach a lower retail price.

It is how DiscountFlies has maintained the distinction at the heart of its business for more than two decades. The flies may be discounted. The craftsmanship behind them is not.

That reputation has taken the company well beyond its own website. More than 200 fly shops carry DiscountFlies products, while guides and lodges also purchase flies for the anglers they serve. A fly tied at a workbench can ultimately find its way into a shop display, a guide's fly box or an order headed directly to someone preparing for a day on the water.

Building a Business Around Variety

Serving individual anglers alongside fly shops, guides and lodges means DiscountFlies has to support very different types of customers.

An angler might need several sizes of a familiar pattern. A guide may be stocking up on flies suited to a particular stretch of water or species. A fly shop needs enough selection to serve customers walking through its doors with different destinations, experience levels and preferences.

Behind all of those needs is inventory that has to remain organized and available when someone is ready to buy. For DiscountFlies, ecommerce fulfillment means moving hundreds of products and variations into the correct customer orders and eventually out the door. When many of those products are small enough to fit dozens inside a fly box, knowing exactly which pattern and size belongs in which package becomes especially important.

For the customer, most of that work is invisible. They choose their flies, place an order and receive a package. For the DiscountFlies team, that package is the end of a much more detailed process.

Keeping Ecommerce Fulfillment in Sync

DiscountFlies has built its fulfillment process around one simple rule: once the day's orders are put in sequence, keep them that way.

The sequence begins in Ordoro, where open orders are sorted by Order ID, grouped into a Daily Batch and printed as packing slips. But that organization does not stay on the screen. As the team picks and packs the day's orders, the physical packages remain in the same Order ID sequence.

That creates a physical mirror of the order queue in Ordoro. A box on the packing table has a direct place in the same sequence the team sees on screen, giving everyone a common reference as orders move through fulfillment.

The structure becomes especially useful during the team's second pass. DiscountFlies returns to the Daily Batch, prints the final packing slips using the appropriate Profile for each order and matches them back to the boxes already waiting in sequence. Shipping labels follow the same path.

Profiles carry another piece of the process beyond the warehouse, determining the branded tracking email and tracking page associated with the shipment.

Rather than changing its fulfillment process to fit the software, DiscountFlies has used Ordoro to support a system built around the way its team prefers to work. From the first packing slip to the final shipping label, the order on the screen and the package on the table stay connected.

Finding Technology That Fits the Operation

DiscountFlies moved from ShipStation to Ordoro in 2025 while looking for a system that could support more of the work happening behind its orders. Shipping was part of that operation, but not all of it. The team also needed to manage fulfillment and inventory across a business with hundreds of individual products and variations. After making the move, DiscountFlies found value in bringing those pieces together, as well as in the people supporting the software.

“The software does everything we need it to do: order fulfillment, inventory, and shipping,” the DiscountFlies team shared. “The software is intuitive. Perhaps more important, the support team is the best I've ever experienced.”

How DiscountFlies uses Ordoro today reflects that relationship between technology and the people doing the work. The team has its own method for organizing a day's orders and moving them through fulfillment. Ordoro gives them the tools to carry that method from the order queue to the packing table and through the final shipping and tracking steps.

More than 25 years after DiscountFlies began, the operation surrounding those tiny products has grown considerably. The company serves individual anglers alongside fly shops, guides and lodges, manages a broad assortment of patterns and variations, and has developed a repeatable process for moving those products from inventory into customer orders.

But the principle behind the business has remained much the same.

DiscountFlies built its reputation by paying attention to the quality of something very small, from the materials selected for a fly to the skill of the person tying it. Today, that same attention to detail extends to the operation surrounding the product, including the inventory, people and fulfillment processes required to get the right flies into the right hands.

Find the Right Flies for Your Next Day on the Water

Whether you're filling a fly box for your next trip, stocking a fly shop or preparing for a season of guiding, DiscountFlies offers a wide selection of flies built around the same commitment to quality and value that has shaped the business for more than 25 years.

Explore dry flies, nymphs, streamers, bass and saltwater flies, along with fly-tying supplies and gear for wherever the water takes you next. Explore DiscountFlies.

Build a Workflow Around the Way Your Team Works

DiscountFlies developed a fulfillment process around the details of its own operation, then used Ordoro to keep the pieces connected from the order queue to the packing table and through shipping.

Your workflow may look completely different. Ordoro brings orders, inventory, shipping and fulfillment together in one place, giving your team the flexibility to build a process around how your business actually operates. Get a Personalized Ordoro Walkthrough.