Our biggest news yet: Slayer Calls brings Joe and Cody McCarthy into the blind
By Danielle Higley Unless you’ve been hiding out under a rock, you know the name Cody McCarthy. He’s currently the world elk calling champion. He’s also, most recently, the new coach and head of product innovation at Slayer Calls. We’re happy to have Cody as part of our team. We are also thrilled to welcome his father, Joe McCarthy, as our product innovation lead. If you’ve been hoping to see something truly revolutionary come out of Slayer Calls, rest assured the best is yet to come.Introducing Joe and Cody McCarthy
The McCarthys’ competitive spirit is a family trait. When he was just nine years old, Cody McCarthy won his first elk calling competition. He used a tube specially built by his dad and beat out experienced hunters more than four times his age. Most kids in that kind of environment would be sweating in their socks, but Cody? He says he wasn’t nervous at all. From the beginning, he was built to compete.

The makings of a champion
Like many kids with parents who hunt, Cody took to the sport at a young age. He began hunting when he was seven, called in his first bull at age eight, and killed his first elk when he was 11. And here’s a crazy fun fact about that — in all his years of hunting, Cody has never killed an elk in any way other than archery, which tells you something about his skills with a bow, even before he was a teenager. Of course, having a competitive nature meant Cody wasn’t only drawn to one outdoor sport. He was also an avid football player. Early on, his dad — who also played college growing up — was one of his coaches. Eventually he played on an all-American high school team and went on to play as a two-time division one athlete for Eastern Washington University.
A partnership that can’t be beat
In May 2022, big news began to circulate among the Slayer team: Cody McCarthy and his father, Joe, were joining the crew. “Adding Cody McCarthy to the Slayer family is a game changer, both for Slayer as a business and for the hunting industry as a whole,” says Bill Ayer, founder and CEO of Slayer Calls. One of the reasons Bill knows Cody and Joe will fit in is their shared values: kindness toward others, family first and hard work.
