The Scheels NOligarchy Profile
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Scheels earns a NOligarchy Score of 89.46 out of 100 — near the top of its sector, though what that score reflects is limited by what public records can actually see. No lobbying filings, Political Action Committee (PAC) contributions, regulatory fines, stock buybacks, or executive pay disclosures have been matched to this company across the sources tracked here, from Q3 2024 through Q2 2026 (8 quarters — the two-year tracking period). As a private company, Scheels operates outside most mandatory public disclosure requirements. What that means in practice: the public record goes quiet on the questions that matter most, and the score reflects the absence of matched records, not a confirmed finding of compliance or spending either way.
Current Pillar Scores
Political Access
100.0
Wealth Extraction
58.2
Playing by the Rules
100.0
Score history — 23 quarters
Tier bands show where each quarter's score falls — no numeric y-axis needed. The dashed ring marks the year-over-year comparison point. Tap any quarter but the first to see its pillar breakdown.
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Political Access Grade: 100/100. No federal lobbying filings, no PAC, and no executive contributions tied to the company have been matched across tracked sources during the two-year period. Whether that reflects genuine absence or a gap in available records is not determinable from what is publicly on file.
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Wealth Extraction Grade: 58.45/100. No stock buyback or dividend data has been matched — a direct consequence of private-company status. No Scheels-specific CEO pay data is on the public record. The grade reflects an industry-wide benchmark estimate for comparable companies in this sector, not a Scheels-specific disclosure.
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Playing by the Rules Grade: 100/100. No regulatory fines, violations, or public subsidies have been matched to Scheels in the tracked sources. That reflects the current state of available records.
Scheels ranks 2nd out of 22 in the Sporting Goods, Hobby, and Musical Instrument Retailers sector, scoring above the sector average of 68.3. Among its peers on the dimensions that public data can reach, that position puts it near the very top — though the caveat is the same: for private companies, high scores can reflect low visibility as much as exemplary conduct.
The Bottom Line: No Matching Records Found Across Tracked Sources
No lobbying, PAC, executive-donation, CEO pay, stock buyback, fine, or subsidy records have been matched to Scheels across any source this project tracks over the two-year period. That reflects the current state of publicly available records — not a confirmed finding that the company has spent nothing, paid nothing in fines, or distributed nothing to shareholders. Private-company status places most of these figures beyond the reach of mandatory public disclosure, and the data simply stops where the disclosure requirements end.
Outside Current Tracking Coverage
No federal lobbying filings tied to Scheels appear in the Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act (LDA) database across the two-year period. No PAC contributions have been matched, and the Federal Election Commission (FEC) shows no individual contributions from executives tied to the company’s name during that same span. No outside lobbying firms and no former government officials registered as lobbyists have been linked to Scheels in any tracked filing.
That absence of matched records is not the same as a confirmed finding. For a sporting goods and outdoor retailer of Scheels’ scale, the policy landscape is active — firearms regulations, import tariffs on sporting equipment, consumer product safety standards, and retail labor rules all carry direct implications for this business. Whether Scheels engages with any of those debates through channels that fall outside current public-record tracking is not visible here.
EXHIBIT — THE RESERVED SEAT
$0 in lobbying · $0 in PAC money
Scheels filed no federal lobbying and ran no corporate PAC in this window — the reserved seat at the witness table sits empty.
Outside Current Tracking Coverage
Because Scheels is privately held, it is not required to publish CEO compensation figures, employee pay data, stock buyback programs, or dividend distributions. None of those figures appear in the public record. No Scheels-specific pay or shareholder distribution data has been matched across tracked sources during the two-year period.
The best available reference point for executive earnings comes from sector-wide benchmarks: the pay ratio is 182:1, based on AFL-CIO Executive Paywatch industry benchmarks for comparable companies in this sector, according to AFL-CIO Executive Paywatch. That means a typical worker in this industry would need to work 182 years to earn what the person at the top earns in one. That figure is an industry estimate applied across comparable companies, not a Scheels-specific disclosure, and it is the basis for the 58.45 Wealth Extraction grade. Whether Scheels falls above or below that benchmark is not determinable from what is publicly available.
Outside Current Tracking Coverage
No regulatory fines, workplace violations, consumer protection penalties, or environmental citations tied to Scheels have been matched in tracked enforcement databases over the two-year period from Q3 2024 through Q2 2026. No public subsidies — grants, tax credits, or incentive packages from state or local governments — appear on the record either. That reflects the current state of matched public records, not a confirmed finding of a clean enforcement history.