Fish House Expo Rolls Through Brainerd

Fish houses are becoming hot commodities this time of year as the lakes freeze and the ice fishing season begins. Many people in Brainerd had the opportunity to see the latest and greatest models of fish houses at the Nilson’s Hardware Ice Castle Fish House Expo at the Brainerd Armory over the weekend.

“We’ve come up with a few of our own models; we have several here at the show that are unique to Nilson’s Hardware and RV that you won’t find at any other dealer,” Nilson’s Hardware Co-Owner Robert Bryce said.

The feature fish house at the Expo was the Grand Outdoors. It’s 24 feet long, features up-to-date amenities and even cool LED lights.

“It’s really got just about everything you need,” Bryce said. “It’s almost more like a home than a fish house or a camper.”

For Robert Bryce, the Fish House business has become a family affair as well.

“Me and my dad purchased Nilson’s Hardware on September 1^st of last year,” Quentin Bryce, Robert’s son and Nilson’s Hardware Co-Owner, said. “We’ve been selling Ice Castle fish houses since 2005 and just getting to learn all the new models and creating our own models is something we’ve been working on and have a lot of fun doing.”

Robert has always wanted to be in the fish house business since building his own fish house as a kid.

“I remember seventh grade I built myself a 6×8 fish house, you know, and all my buddies thought it was the greatest thing,” The elder Bryce said. “I had one of the nicest house out on the lake. To think back that that was roughly 30 years ago and to where we’ve come now is just amazing.”

Robert says he brought the Expo to Brainerd because of the abundant amount of expos in the Twin Cities and the abundant of interest in the Lakes Country area.

“A lot of people in rural Minnesota don’t want to go down to the cities,” Robert Bryce said. “Brainerd is centrally located and is, of course, it’s a great area up here for fishing. There are a lot of fisherman up here and a lot of lakes.”

This was the sixth year for the expo.