I love mobile apps, especially good ones that make certain tasks easier and more convenient than they were before. The Happy Hunts app aims to make finding and booking outdoor services easier by creating a marketplace for them.
Anyone who’s tried to find guided hunts and land for lease knows it’s not always easy to gather all the available options. So when I learned the app and website is designed for exactly that, I was intrigued. I downloaded the iPad app and this is my review.
Contents:
Easy Sign Up
The sign up is very easy. You enter your name and email address to make an account. When you confirm your email you are ready to start. I like to always complete my profile on sites like these because you are dealing with real people.
If you’ve ever booked a place on Airbnb, you know it is important for both parties to have complete profiles with pictures to be comfortable knowing who they are doing business with.
The Outdoors Marketplace
Once inside the app, you will see the main categories in the sidebar, along with a bunch of checkboxes to filter the listings. When the site becomes more active, I can see the filters being a nice feature to quickly narrow down your options.
The categories are List Property, Hunting Packages, Outdoor Services, and Fishing. Hunting Packages are currently the most active category, but the others have a lot of potential as well.
List Property – This is where people can book or offer the use of hunting cabins, land for lease, and more. I look forward to the day when there is a bunch of hunting leases listed here. It’s a major pain point for a lot of hunters I know.
Hunting Packages – Guides offer all kinds of hunting trips, all across the country. At the time I was looking, there were 33 packages being offered in North America.
Outdoor Services – Here you can list or book meat processing, taxidermy, book outfitters, and even lease equipment. This is another category I think has a lot of potential.
Fishing – This is where fishing guides and charter boats can list their services. There were no listings when I reviewed the app, but it’s fine as the site is more focused on building hunting listings at the moment.
I found the listings to be very easy to browse. The map view was easiest to use, but I wish there were listings showing below as I zoomed in. I had to click the map pin to see individual listings in the area shown.
When you find an interesting listing, click and you will see more details on the service. For hunt packages, you will see the types of weapons the guide allows, what the season dates are, and whether the hunt is 100% fair chase or partial.
If you like what you see, but have questions, simply use the contact button to message the guide right within the app.
When you want to book the guide, you click “Request”, and then “Proceed to Payment”. Assuming the guide is set up to take payments, you will be sent to PayPal to finish the transaction.
I think PayPal is good, as most people are familiar with it today, and they have built-in consumer protection and dispute resolution should you need it (even though unlikely).
Overall Thoughts
While most of the listing are currently Hunting Packages, I could see this app as being super useful when they get more land listings and guide participation. I know how time-consuming it can be to gather options for guided hunts and hunting leases, and it will be nice to have it all in one place.
Overall I like what Happy Hunts is trying to achieve with the “Outdoors Marketplace” idea. It’s clean, easy to navigate, and I hope they keep working on filling out the marketplace.
