Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics Ethical Optical Companies

http://www.ethicalconsumer.org/portals/0/downloads/optics%20report.pdf

This is an FYI post. I put it here because of the focus on Ethical Optical Companies, the definition of which is a company that does not appear to actively promote sales of its product to hunters. I'm not sure where to post this or even if it should be posted. It will anger a lot of folks. But is representative of the opposition of hunting that we should be aware of. This showed up on Bird Forum in the binocular sub forum.

The whole deal is 67 pages. The anti-hunting message is in the first 15 or so pages. Most of it has to do with company profiles of the identified optical companies.

Note that Campfire here is The Communal Areas Management Programme for Indigenous Resources. Some of the Africa posters no doubt are aware of this outfit as they seem to be in Zimbabwe (surprise..huh?).

You should probably read this. Do not expect to be in good humor when you are done.

I saw that over there Steve. Posted by a Euro socialist dolt no less.

This is really all I need to see


Who to buy from? If you're the PETA type.....
Recommended companies are Canon Inc., Fujifilm Holdings
Corporation, the Olympus Corporation and Kenko Tokina
Co., which were the only companies covered that could not
be directly linked with the sport hunting industry. The RSPB’s
own branded optics, supplied by Viking Optical, also do not
sponsor hunting or promote shooting equipment.
The other five companies with weaker links to sport hunting
may also be a good choice. The main brands in this group
are: Celestron, Opticron, Pentax, Visionary and Kowa.

Consumers who hold animal rights issues close to heart
may want to avoid companies committed to hunting. These
are: Nikon, Bushnell, Vortex, Meopta, Minox, Leica, Steiner,
Burris, Swarovski, Leupold, Vanguard, Zeiss, Hawke, Bresser,
National Geographic, Acuter, Barska, Visionking, Bosma and
Alpen brands.

Kowa also recommended as ethical.

The thing with this one however is it is actually less of a poorly written diatribe than most. The marketing skill of this mindset seem to be sharpening its response. Not that it is any less pure BS.

It was pure activist BS but curious how many dollars are spent on all non camera optics for hunting vs everything else.

Nikon goes out of its way to not show it actually makes hunting scopes and binos.

it's called Extortion.

It is a drop in a big bucket...

Thanks, I had no idea.

Nikon is a big player in hunting optics, and they prominently
display that in their advertising.

You are way off base here.

I'll let you be the judge on interpreting this:

Scopes and binoculars sold to hunters is a miniscule part of Nikon's business. They have a 6 or 7 story building in NY with one floor rented out and the rest with Nikon employees. With all those floors and offices they have about 10 employees for the shooting and hunting market, if they stopped selling scopes tomorrow it would hardly be a blip on their bottom line. The "powers that be" in Japan are not exactly big hunters LOL! The guys in the hunting division are good guys and pro hunting but I certainly wouldn't call the company pro-hunting beyond the fact that they can make some money off of us. There have been rumors about them pulling out of the hunting market all together for years.

Have you ever seen a Nikon ad with a dead animal in it???

I remember Doug stating several times that he is unable to carry Nikon scopes because he sells Nikon cameras, and the camera side of the house basically disavows the scope side.

That being said;

I sold all my Nikon Monarch scopes due to their position on hunting. The company treats the sporting division like a stepchild.

This type of stuff makes me want to go out and buy one each of these.

Its not like Nikon scopes are cutting edge regardless...

Just more UK commies do gooders, trying to change the world.

Eschenbach, they are a small German eyeglass manufacturer, why are they even included. They might was well added Rodenstock too.

Bingo.

Not to say I blame them for earning a profit, however, they're one of the last companies I'd support with my cheddar.

Exactly who is "cutting edge" in scopes? They've been pretty much figured out for decades, anything new is really just marketing.

I would have to agree with dogcatcher. Nikon's lack of matching turrets/reticles, incredibly limited reticle choice, mediocre glass, lack of FFP options, devotion to their ridiculous BDC, etc....

Decent? Sure. Leading the pack? Absolutely not. I dont even consider Nikon when looking for scopes. Its not that I sont think they are good, they simply dont offer anything that isnt done better by someone else.

Thanks, you just summed it up for me.