(FORTUNE Small Business) – Steve Rogers, owner of Rogers Sporting Goods in Liberty, Mo., watched with mounting concern as outdoor mail-order giant Cabela's built a new store in Kansas City, 40 minutes north. The 180,000-square-foot showroom boasts a 65,000-gallon aquarium, a giant Conservation Mountain taxidermy diorama of stuffed game animals, a gun library stocked with high-end shotguns and rifles, and more than 100,000 outdoor products on the shelves.

Cabela's, based in Sidney, Neb., and its rival, Bass Pro Shops of Springfield, Mo., are the two largest companies selling hunting and fishing gear. Both were catalog-based until the mid-1990s, when they started bringing their catalogs to three-dimensional life in lavish "destination stores." Cabela's now operates 20 such stores, Bass Pro Shops has 27, and both plan to open more in the coming years.

How does an independent retailer such as Rogers survive when one of these giants opens nearby? "We carry a wide selection of the items our customers want most at a low price," Rogers says simply. "We'll have people stop here, go to Cabela's, then come back and buy from us." Although Rogers's metal building is less than a tenth the size of the one Cabela's opened nearby in 2002, local hunters and fishermen know that his crowded shelves offer an unparalleled selection of certain items. You won't find hammocks or food dehydrators--both of which are carried by Cabela's--but if you're looking for a locally popular fishing lure, Rogers is the place.

"We're known for our lure selection," says Rogers. "Wiggle Warts [a hot-selling lure for walleye fishing] come in 98 colors. Cabela's stocks 15 to 20. We carry 95. They might offer 40 colors of a certain crappie bait; we'll have 200 colors." Surprisingly, Rogers often beats Cabela's on price. Six Greenhead Gear goose decoys sell for $139.99 at Rogers, $20 below Cabela's catalog price. "We don't believe in much margin," says Rogers. "If I had the big 40% markup other stores have, I'd have retired a long time ago."