I don’t understand how S&W can be so tone deaf to the market. The hillary hole is something that nobody wants and has never wanted. I can’t understand why S&W continues to be the one manufacturer with one. I won’t buy a new S&W revolver when I can buy an older one without it.
Right now I am seeing some really quality barely used guns out there at the lgs's at decent prices. Most have not been shot much but fondled some, carried a little, then traded for something new repeat the cycle of the last one. Legacy of the if you can only have one morons. Can't see farther than todays wants or how much credit left on their card. You get more interest out of one you bought right price wise than you get out of your passbook savings for sure. They don't spoil and increase in value. Can't remember when I've seen more selection of barely used carry guns out there for sale. Market is slow but selection great. I think there is a lot of person to person transfers going on and that is good also. Just my 2 cts...mb
" Cheapest velocity in the world comes from a long barrel and I sure do like them. MB "
I don’t understand how S&W can be so tone deaf to the market. The hillary hole is something that nobody wants and has never wanted. I can’t understand why S&W continues to be the one manufacturer with one. I won’t buy a new S&W revolver when I can buy an older one without it.
We've created a liability trap in the US on this sort of thing, i.e., if you have any feature on a gun that's described as a safety feature, and then you remove it, anyone who sues after that, claiming that its absence was the cause of their injury, will automatically win.
Inflation has a lot to do with it, but other factors are limiting purchases too. The manufacturers themselves should be to blame for some of it.
The market is somewhat stagnant. The lack of product innovation is taking its toll. Consumers are begging for new quality product and it’s falling on deaf ears. In Smith’s case, there are still some revolvers in demand and the debacle with Thompson Center left a hole in their portfolio. Guys are simply growing weary of the same old commodity firearms - plastic pistols, plastic rifles….everything that’s shipping regularly is a “budget” gun. Those guns will always have their place, but can’t consume the market.
Without new innovations and upper end offerings, shoppers are fatigued. They’re not churning and trading for the latest and greatest. The rifle market is really lacking, as is the shotgun market. Hardly anything upper end available in mass quantities from Beretta, Benelli, Winchester, Browning, Remington, Kimber…the list goes on. And upper end is now defined as models that were previously available as standard offerings. Stainless rifles, wood stocked rifles, wood stocked shotguns are all slow to ship.
It’s a different time and the manufacturers own a bunch of that blame. I don’t feel sorry for them. Publicly traded companies are slow to react because of all the hoops. Too many levels of approval and individuals trying to justify their jobs. If they spent more time building what the consumer wanted instead of building what they wanted to build, things might be a little different.
I’m home with flu and bored. I’m also tired of manufacturers not owning the blame for a soft market.
That sums it up.
I dare you to find anything not wrapped in plastic these days. Can't Ruger put out f'king Hawkeyes like a few years ago? Browning, I haven't seen anything from them in 2 years. Winchester Model 70's? Remington 700 in a wood BDL stock or Mountain Rifle?
Plastic trash for a plastic trash society.
What if Jessie's girl is Stacy's mom, and her phone number is 867-5309
All those various plastic semi-auto handguns have been selling like hot cakes during the BLM riots and the Dems winning the White House. Almost all of these will outlive their owners. Couple that with ongoing demographic changes - proportionately fewer young adult first-time gun buyers, greater numbers of hoplophobic (to borrow a Col. Cooper term) Leftists.
In general, I believe around these parts at least, the increase in supply roughly correlates to the greater number of high school kids caught with a handgun on campus in recent years, there’s just more guns around.
Note: IMHO almost all the kids with a gun on campus have no intention of shooting up the school, else over the nation (or even just Texas) those events would be happening every week.
No I’m not in favor of more gun laws.
"...if the gentlemen of Virginia shall send us a dozen of their sons, we would take great care in their education, instruct them in all we know, and make men of them." Canasatego 1744
I don’t understand how S&W can be so tone deaf to the market. The hillary hole is something that nobody wants and has never wanted. I can’t understand why S&W continues to be the one manufacturer with one. I won’t buy a new S&W revolver when I can buy an older one without it.
They know, they try to hide that hole in all their adds.
I still buy a lot of smiths, just older revolvers. Picked up a nice model 60 the other day.
They did hit a home run with the M&P series, those are great autos.
Inflation has a lot to do with it, but other factors are limiting purchases too. The manufacturers themselves should be to blame for some of it.
The market is somewhat stagnant. The lack of product innovation is taking its toll. Consumers are begging for new quality product and it’s falling on deaf ears. In Smith’s case, there are still some revolvers in demand and the debacle with Thompson Center left a hole in their portfolio. Guys are simply growing weary of the same old commodity firearms - plastic pistols, plastic rifles….everything that’s shipping regularly is a “budget” gun. Those guns will always have their place, but can’t consume the market.
Without new innovations and upper end offerings, shoppers are fatigued. They’re not churning and trading for the latest and greatest. The rifle market is really lacking, as is the shotgun market. Hardly anything upper end available in mass quantities from Beretta, Benelli, Winchester, Browning, Remington, Kimber…the list goes on. And upper end is now defined as models that were previously available as standard offerings. Stainless rifles, wood stocked rifles, wood stocked shotguns are all slow to ship.
It’s a different time and the manufacturers own a bunch of that blame. I don’t feel sorry for them. Publicly traded companies are slow to react because of all the hoops. Too many levels of approval and individuals trying to justify their jobs. If they spent more time building what the consumer wanted instead of building what they wanted to build, things might be a little different.
I’m home with flu and bored. I’m also tired of manufacturers not owning the blame for a soft market.
Lotta sense there, coming from a guy on the front lines, so to speak.
I can attest to the dismal situation with regard to the situation with nice guns, in my case a Browning O/U. Ordered one, and it was eight months before it showed. Nothing fancy, just a 725 Field. By then I’d given up and bought a nice used one. The deciding factor was that the dealer said they couldn’t tell when it would show, and that they had no way to check, but a call to Browning after four months revealed that there were none slated for that dealer for at least another two months, and no telling beyond that. The availability can’t be helped, but a phone call doesn’t seem to be a lot to ask.
I agree too on the quality what’s being shipped. It’s very hard to get enthused by yet another Tupperware®️ rifle with a crappy black finish and yet another unique detachable magazine that going to cause someone a lot of trouble someday when it’s lost or breaks and there are none to be found. Ever see spares for sale in the same shop where the rifles are available? Me neither, and I won’t buy such an animal before securing a couple of spares. Hell, based on the posts here, a lot of them that come with the rifles are defective. Same applies to pistols of course. AR, Glock and 1911 mags are practically convenience store items, but not so with the latest Turkish knock-off of a knock-off.
My local gunshop has boxes of guns in the isles. He back ordered anything he could, and now he has it all. I have no idea how he operates, because he is pretty expensive, but I guess that profit keeps him afloat. I see other shops have more inventory, and I think demand is down. People have to heat the house and buy food. So I think supply and demand will bring back reasonable prices. Of course ammo has to come down also. I don't think many will buy guns that they can't afford to shoot.
Firearms spending, let's face it, comes from discretionary funding in any household. REAL inflation is around 20% any way you slice it. So considering the stats that say the average household has less than a 1000 in the cookie jar for emergencies...I don't see where most folks have any money to spare.
Used gun shelves are slowly beginning to fill back up @ local shops and at prices that are beginning to re-enter earth's atmosphere as well. Shops are also starting to mark down excess/slow-moving ammo that was "What they could get" in favor of now "What people WANT".
NOT IN OREGON!
"Minus the killings, Washington has one of the lowest crime rates in the Country" Marion Barry, Mayor of Wash DC
“Owning guns is not a right. If it were a right, it would be in the Constitution.” ~Alexandria Ocasio Cortez
I don’t understand how S&W can be so tone deaf to the market. The hillary hole is something that nobody wants and has never wanted. I can’t understand why S&W continues to be the one manufacturer with one. I won’t buy a new S&W revolver when I can buy an older one without it.
