HOOKSETT – Local sports retailers don't fear the arrival of Cabela's in their neighborhood and some even predict the nation's leading hunting and fishing outfitter might increase their own catch of customers.

Hooksett voters next week will decide on an $18 million tax district to entice Cabela's to a 55-acre site on Route 3A near the Interstate 93 Exit 11 toll booth. The vote would authorize millions in road improvements, water and sewer line expansion and construction of museum wings at the four corners of the Cabela's store.

Cabela's operates 14 stores nationwide focusing on outdoor sports equipment and apparel. After analyzing their catalog sales, the company is making a move into New England, with a store planned for East Hartford, Conn., and others in the mix for southern Massachusetts and southern Maine.

Cabela's began in the 1960s with a small, mail-order fly fishing lure operation that eventually expanded into catalog sales. The company's first store opened in Sidney, Neb. — now the site of the retailer's corporate headquarters — in 1991.

Cabela's stores typically feature taxidermy displays, fish tanks, antique gun collections and laser shooting arcade games. The attractions are meant to lure the hunters and fishing enthusiasts that make up the bulk of the store's customers.

In Hooksett, several shops already fill the need for rifles, fishing rods and other merchandise found at Cabela's. Those businesses are looking at Cabela's as they did Wal-Mart and Dick's Sporting Goods: eagerly awaiting the arrival of Cabela's to shed more light on the specialty stores.

"There's two ways to look at it — are they going to come in and eat my lunch? I don't think so," said Ralph Demicco, owner of Riley's Sport Shop on Route 3, almost directly across the Merrimack River from the Cabela's site. "My job will be to bring those people across the river and visit an old-fashioned gun shop."

Cabela's carries a limited supply of firearms, not nearly as many models as Riley's, company spokesman Darren Robinson said. In much the same way Wal-Mart employees refer customers with niche needs to expert shops, Cabela's often sends its customers on to local gun shops for servicing or specialized items, Robinson said.

For a business such as Steve's Sportsmen's Den, an archery and fishing retailer across from Riley's on Route 3, the experience of their employees would be a prime selling point in trying to compete with Cabela's.

Internet sales and discount merchants such as Wal-Mart nicked away sales from bait and tackle shops, but for sports buffs seeking wisdom, small mom and pops corner the market, said Steve Courchesne, owner of the Sportsmen's Den.

"We sell more knowledge than anything else," Courchesne said. "If I look at (Cabela's) as a business aspect, it could bring a lot more people in."

Shops that overlap products with Dick's Sporting Goods or Cabela's learned to join them if they can't beat them, said Ivan Bellemare, assistant manager of Paintball Wizard on Route 3 in Hooksett. Wizard, a satellite store to another in Tewksbury, Mass., built a sales force on servicing paintball guns, the majority of which are bought online or in other stores.

Paintball Wizard forged relationships with local paintball fields to provide authorized gear and equipment. Much of the paintball ammunition on sale at Wal-Mart, for example, isn't fresh enough to be allowed on New Hampshire fields, said D.J. Kennepohl, a regular customer at Paintball Wizard.

"You're in awe when you go into a Cabela's, but they're not any cheaper than other stores," said Kennepohl.

Shop owners such as Demicco expected some kind of national competitor by now, whether it be Cabela's or similar operations such as Gander Mountain and Bass Pro Shops.

"If they're going to be here, I'd actually like them a little closer," said Demicco, adding half-jokingly: "My backyard would be great."

Other proprietors see Cabela's not as a competitor, but a source of free advertising.

"It'll be good for New Hampshire, put us on the map," said Courchesne.