The folks at Gruv Fishing sent me three of their new boxes to check out as they are brand new to the fishing market. I found these new ideas for tackle boxes interesting. So here is a closer look at the features of their first three fishing tackle storage box offerings—the Micro Jig Box, the Big Jig Box and the Hard Bait Box.
Sectional removable soft dividers
All of the Gruv Fishing boxes are designed with a durable polycarbonate shell and use molded soft silicone inserts to hold your lures in place.
The Gruv Fishing Hard Bait Box features a series of soft silicone dividers that are removable and flex to snugly hold your hard plastic or wooden fishing lures in place. The system seems best suited for more narrow, smaller or flat sided hard baits. A large, round hard bait takes a little modification to fit into the box. You can remove ever other divider and change the configuration of how it holds the lures which makes them pretty adaptable. But I found it held my flat sided crankbaits like the Spro Little John MD really well. I fit 21 into the 9-inch by 7-inch box easily.
Dividers flex to hold baits and hooks fold under in slotted trays
The baits snug into the dividers well on the Gruv Fishing Hard Bait box. I did find you have to exercise some caution to get the crankbaits out when the box was full because there was not a lot of room to navigate the hooks around the dividers. But you can pull up on the dividers and move one out of the way of the hooks as you pull the crankbait out and then put it back into place easy enough. I did snag a hook into one of the dividers so be careful not to try to snatch a crankbait up out of the box to aggressively.
Magnet lids hold the boxes closed
The Gruv Fishing Storage Boxes feature magnetic enclosures that hold the lids closed instead of traditional latches. There are round magnets spaced around the clear plastic lid and the solid plastic body of the boxes.
One thing I did notice on the Hard Bait Box, I had to make sure the crankbaits were all seated down into the silicone grooves all the way to make sure the lid and bottom magnets would connect. But once all the magnets were touching the lid stayed closed. I even could turn the boxes upside down and the lids would stay sealed. I’m not sure how waterproof the enclosure stays.
Well constructed hinges make the box easy to open and close
The Gruv Fishing boxes are made of a hard plastic polycarbonate and feature multiple hinges with rods for a smooth and solid joint that makes the lids easy to open and close without worry of warping and wear.
Hard rigid plastic construction
The Gruv Fishing boxes feature hard plastic construction. They are very solid boxes. My one fear is that the box would not survive a drop onto a hard surface from a moderate distance because of their weight rigidness. But if you’re careful with them, they store and display your baits securely and easily so you can see in an instant what is in every box.
The Micro Jig Box
Probably my favorite box in the new Gruv Fishing lineup is the Micro Jig Box. I put several different styles of heads in various colors and weights and like the options you have to store a lot of jigs, flies, jigheads and even hooks and other small terminal tackle easily and neatly. This box looks pretty sweet full of tungsten jigheads. It will be my new crappie fishing jig box.
The Big Jig Box
The Gruv Fishing Big Jig Box is a medium sized box at 9-inches x 7-inches and 2-inches deep. It says it can hold up to 115 jigs, jigheads or hooks. I experimented with a mix of the two by putting multiple varieties of swimbait heads into the box. The polycarbonate shell has the same molded silicone insert system as the Micro Jig Box with an obviously larger footprint. It held even the heaviest jigheads at more than 1 ounce easily. It had a little trouble with really heavy 3/4-ounce 10-o weighted swimbait hooks, but that was more because of how the weight is on the hook. It kept causing the hook to tip over which would pop it up out of its groove. But it held big jigs, hooks, and jigheads really well.
I tried the Big Jig Box with Swimbait Heads
The offset configuration of the silicone groove inserts allows you to store a lot of smaller heads side by side alternating directions or you can space them out a little more to store larger heads and hooks. I stored a variety of sizes and models of swimbait heads including the 1-ounce VMC Flat Side Jig Head, the 3/4-ounce Lazer Trokar Magnum Swimbait Hook, 1-ounce Z-Man Headlockz HD Swim Jig Heads, 1 ounce Scottsboro Tackle Company Recon Swimbait heads, and 1/2 ounce Boss Swimbait Switchblade Heads.
They stack in their grooves
The Gruv Fishing tackle boxes stack well on each other. The polycarbonate shells have a groove on the lids and bottoms that keep them from slipping off of each other when stacked.
Overall a neat concept for storing fishing lures and tackle
Overall, I thought the Gruv Fishing boxes were a neat concept and well made. They display your baits really orderly which anglers with OCD like me will like. The boxes are very heavy duty. For example, the Big Jig Box weighs 20 ounces empty. The are well constructed. The hold your tackle securely in place without worry of them banging, scratching and otherwise damaging each other. The prices range from $18 for the Micro Jig box to $30 for the Big Jig or Hard Bait boxes.
I would be interested to see a weather-sealed version of the boxes in later releases.
You can find the Gruv Fishing boxes at GruvFishing.com, and they have a small network of dealers already, which I’m sure will expand soon.
