Koya Lures-JP Lures Series Introduction

Approximately 15 years ago, Eric Koyanagi started his lure-making career under the wings of his mentor, Joe Palacat, lure maker of the original JP Lures. Their strong relationship is the basis behind this post: the re-introduction of JP Lures, brought to you by Eric Koyanagi, lure maker of Koya Lures.

Joe and Eric have known each other for roughly 30 years, and their friendship was a major influence on Eric’s desire to build lures himself. It is not a coincidence that at around the same time Joe stopped making his own lures that Eric was beginning the process of carving his own path - Joe was in fact teaching Eric the “tricks of the trade.” That in turn may have been one of the strongest influences behind the sudden rise of the Koya Lures brand - If you know the history behind JP Lures, you will know that Eric was in good hands with Joe as his mentor.

Joe began making lures in the late 80's. His skills in lure production became evident very quickly, and word spread throughout the world as massive fish were caught on them - The Lunger quickly became one of the most sought after lures produced by any lure maker in Hawaii. 

Lure-making was primarily a hobby of his - very few were produced at a time, and production was hardly consistent in numbers. That being said, his 14” Lunger became world famous over time after multiple Granders and other trophy fish were caught on them. The demand for his lures far exceeded production over the years as more and more fishermen discovered them thanks to word-of-mouth marketing from all over the globe. The fact that this happened in a day and age without the availability of Social Media and with such few numbers in production is beyond remarkable. 

As stated before, Joe rarely produced in high numbers, especially the kind of numbers that are produced today by some of the world’s best. In 2004, when he unofficially closed up shop after roughly 17 years of working in lure production, a whole world of demand was left in the wake. 

Which brings us to the main objective of this post - the re-introduction of JP Lures. The 14” Lunger & other JP shapes you see here were hand-crafted by Eric Koyanagi using Joe’s original molds after Joe gave him the rights (and the master copies) to reproduce his entire JP Lures line-up. This will be the truest representation to the original JP Lures that you will find on the market with the “JP Lures” signature on each lure as well. To even further provide evidence of Joe’s hand in this series of lures, he provided Eric with some of his original “Grander Paper” that produced multiple Granders alone - The “Grander Paper” name that was given to this particular wrap style is obvious to those in the know and no longer exists, so you can be sure of their authenticity.

Due to the fact that shell was rarely if ever used by Joe on his original lures, most of the JP lures you will see initially produced by Koya Lures will come with similar insert styles to what Joe originally used including Chrome, Starburst, and the “Grander Paper” as well as a similar eye style to give proper homage to the original creator. Every process performed on these JP Lures was chosen with respect to Joe. 

Now is the time to share JP Lures with the world again. We are very excited to introduce the new Koya-JP Lures lineup to you all. Those of you who have been craving to get your hands on an original will finally have the opportunity to add them to your spread again with the re-introduction of the world-renowned JP Lures.