Written by: Irwin Greenstein
Pikesville, MD – -(Ammoland.com)- Highland Hills Ranch is a sensuous indulgence for upland hunters.
The contours of Oregon’s high-desert rolling hills summon womanly curves shamelessly gorgeous beneath sun-infused blue. After a day of stalking valley quail, chukars, pheasants and huns over dogs, Chef Keith Potter seduces you with a perfume of homemade bakery and dinners fragrant of Western, Latin and Pacific Rim influences as the provincial pinot noirs comfort body and soul. Come dessert, you’re spent and benevolent. The vaulted log great room is aglow with amber lamplight. You plop into a supple leather couch for single malts, bourbon and camaraderie, savoring the warmth of a stone hearth blaze.
A weekend at Highland Hills Ranch shows why the little-known Beretta Premium Division conducted a briefing in mid-September 2013 at this Beretta Trident destination to share a compelling vision for 2014 and beyond that combines shotguns we lust after with Italian sporting fashion and breathtaking journeys into a fabulous hunting lifestyle for new and experienced shooters.
The sessions proved much more than Powerpoint show-and-tells. In the large mudroom at Highland Hills Ranch stood a rack of more than 20 Beretta luxury shotguns for our upland hunts and an afternoon of clays that launched targets from the ravine and hilltop bird habitats.
The collection was a candy store of shotgunning extravagance that displayed the multi-Olympic-winner SO5 Sporting sidelock ($27,500), the gorgeous sidelock SO10 ($90,000), the legendary Giubileo ($13,150), the heavy-artillery clays crusher DT11 ($9,000), the SO6EELL sidelock ($50,000), the SO6EELL-derived Sparviere with it’s amazing “gullwing” side plates ($90,000) in addition to the forthcoming 20-Gauge Beretta 486 Side by Side among others built by the Beretta Premium Division in Brescia, Italy.
Beretta’s executive clout in attendance at Highland Hills Ranch substantiated an impending Renaissance in the American shotgun market — an opportunity Beretta identified by field and competition models that essentially start at $10,000 and escalate to $100,000 and more.
The baseline segmentation evolved from a reorganization that spanned Beretta Italy and Beretta USA. The new corporate offspring is called the Beretta Premium Division. It’s an amalgamation of the Premium Shotgun Group, the Gallery Stores, the Clothing & Accessories Group and the Beretta Trident Program. The consolidation of resources under the Beretta Premium Division forms a sporting lifestyle marketing powerhouse directed at the affluent.
Antonio Pavan, a relatively new appointment to Vice President of Beretta’s Premium Division, explained that the group’s emphasis is on the cream of the consumer market.
Well-heeled connoisseurs will be immersed in a veritable boutique of exceptional Beretta shotguns, adventure-inspired fashions and bravura hunting holidays. The Beretta Premium Division will provide exclusive membership incentives and so-called value-added experiences at super-luxe places like Blackberry Farm, such as the one held November 9-10, 2013 in the eastern Tennessee foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains.
IMG 2149Clemente Scribani Rossi, Beretta USA Premium Gun Sales Manager, displays the open “gullwings” that expose the precision sidelock action of Beretta’s SO6EELL-derived Sparviere at Highland Hills Ranch.
At Blackberry Farm, for $5,000 to $15,000 per night depending on accommodations, 30 guests participated in a lavish Beretta junket that included culinary presentations, clays shooting instructions by two-time Olympic skeet gold medalist Vincent Hancock, a discussion by Ed Anderson who is the gunsmith at the Beretta Gallery in New York City, demonstrations by Beretta’s Master Engraver Luca Casari and a finale dinner hosted by Franco Beretta who serves as the company’s Vice President and Managing Director in Italy as well as Executive Vice President of Beretta USA. He gave away a new 486 Parallelo 12-gauge side by side.
Ian Harrison, who recently assumed management of the Beretta Trident Program from his role as Manager of the Beretta Dallas Gallery, explained that the purpose of partnering with resorts like Blackberry Farm, Sea Island, the 14 Beretta Trident affiliates and other elegant venues worldwide is to evangelize the Beretta lifestyle.
Read the compete article at ShotGun Life: https://tiny.cc/3cu56w
About Shotgun Life:
Shotgun Life is published by SGL Media, LLC. Prior to founding Shotgun Life in 2009, Irwin Greenstein spent 15 years in Silicon Valley as a marketing and media-relations executive specializing in technology start-ups. Visit Shotgun Life at www.shotgunlife.com.