You owe it to yourself to check out USA Today’s feature on Johnny Morris, founder and CEO of Bass Pro Shops.

In addition to offering some rare comments from the typically publicity shy executive, the story also puts forward a clear picture of how having a vision and trusting your gut can pay off. That’s the secret to how Morris built Bass Pro from a shelf at his father’s liquor store to a chain of 56 huge destination stores.

Pay attention to the details about Morris scouting products for his shop not by paying big bucks for research but by keeping an eye on what sportsmen were up to. When he saw a product he knew would sell, he got behind it – even when it bucked traditional business models. And when he designed his first store, he did what he knew would draw in customers, regardless of what bankers thought of his ideas.

Morris is still sticking with his instincts, too. As the story points out, while competing chain Cabela’s is changing the way they do business (and the way their stores look and feel) because of the down economy, Bass Pro is sticking with what it knows works. That approach has slowed growth for the short term, but it will pay off in the end. Because as usual, Morris is making decisions based on what he knows customers will respond to – and that approach has yet to be proven wrong.