The Freedom Group

“Procter & Gamble Co. plans to cut more than half of its brands, as the world’s largest consumer products company slims down amid sluggish sales,” latimes.com reports. “The Cincinnati-based firm will shed 90 to 100 brands and focus investment on remaining product lines that comprise more than 95% of company profit, Chief Executive A.G. Lafley said in a conference call with analysts Friday. ‘This will be a much simpler, much less complex company,’ he said.” Can someone forward this post to Freedom Group CEO George Kollitides? More than that, I reckon America’s largest gun brands are selling too many models. This tsunami of SKUs confuses consumers (how do you choose?), dilutes brands (what is a Marlin?) and lowers quality (you call that a Marlin?). Now that the gun boom has gone bust, it’s time for these storied gun brands to cut extraneous models and concentrate on core products. Am I wrong?

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85 COMMENTS

    • [Sheena Iyengar’ ]… dissertation, “Choice and its Discontents,” which asks the question: are there circumstances in which people are better off when they have their choices limited or entirely removed, received the prestigious Best Dissertation Award for 1998 from the Society of Experimental Social Psychology.[1][2]…

      It’s wonderful, as long as she, you, Obama and the Chamber of Commerce get to decide what our choices are limited to, right?

      Sic semper tyrannis.

      Or in English: to all wannabe statist scum, ESAD.

  4. 30years ago P&G was universally regarded as the finest example of the multinational corporate mass market consumer goods company. The MBA talking heads convinced the world that the alumni of P&G could successfully run any company, anywhere and that it to the heights of prosperity. And the P&G mafia spread out everywhere. (and that Big BLue/ IBM was all that need know about “technology” and data processing). Ummmm not so much. Didn’t work.

    Capitalistic competion is what works. And fewer business schools and more engineering.

  6. Talk about too many choices, take a gander at SIG’s pistol products page. The venerable P226, as an example has 25, yes 25, variations! I mean c’mon, do we really need 25 models to choose from?

      • I have mixed feelings about this approach. On the one hand, different grips do not make a different model.

        On the other hand, MD, NY, CA, etc. tend to ban “models” of guns. In MD the mini-14 folding stock model is banned. Not, the ranch rifle or target model. See how that works?

        • Seriously? What happens if you put on a Choate folding stock? Does it suddenly become unlawful to posess?

        • What happens if you put on a folding stock*?

          Probably, yes, illegal to possess. Thank’s O’Malley!

          *Note that a folding stock is not a collapsible stock!

  7. Yes RF you are a little off. Guns like muscle cars back in the 60s require a little research and thought before you buy. The reason for so many new models is best summed up by the acronym they taught me back when I sold cars:
    S: Safety
    P: Performance
    A: Appearance
    C: Cost
    E: Economy
    D: Dependability

    you can sell a lot of crappy cars and guns long as you can show value in those areas either through brand reputation or deception. All the options we have now are here because each company thinks they can do it just as well for a lower price or offer a better value at their price point.

  8. Marketing 101 – It’s time to axe some of these brands like General Motor’s had to do with Oldsmoblie & Pontiac. When consumers think of a brand and they can’t promptly develop a perception of the brand (the mrktg term is Product Position), it’s not a good place to be.

  9. I’m not an economy buff, but a private business has to concentrate on the widgets that make money if they are to stay in business. The same applies to the gun industry. Government, on the other hand, runs on a loss and has little incentive to save money.

    Although I believe there is plenty of market available for a high-quality Rem 700 or Marlin 1895, those products no longer exist due to Freedom Groups mismanagement. Those products could easily make money if they haven’t turned to junk. Some products will need to be consolidated due to demand falling off. Hopefully companies will continue to make good stuff during the downsizing.

    Thankfully we have a website here that can differentiate quality products from market hype.

  10. It’s not a simple problem.

    First you need to identify where you’re competing with yourself and shouldn’t be. (Mercury Lynx vs Ford Escort, say.)

    Then you need to choose not only which lines to reduce (e.g. kill off the Mercury Lynx because the profit per car sold is lower than for the Escort, or kill off the Escort to maintain a gateway luxury car?) but also whether you should retire entire brands (e.g. Mercury now only has two car lines left, one of which competes with Ford and the other cannibalizes Lincoln sales).

    Even if you’re not self-competing, eliminating some product lines can reduce the brand’s economy of scale – can Mercury make a sufficient profit selling only one car?

    I’m not saying TFG shouldn’t consider this, but you need to do it carefully. Me, I’d consider what are the brand’s iconic images first, and then ask if they’re distinct enough from other things in the line. DPMS vs Bushmaster comes to mind, for instance.

  11. Freedom of choice is good. Gun companies should perfect anything they sell. I’ve only been at this 3&half years and already have NO intention of buying from Remington. YMMV

  12. More innovation should not be equated with more brands. The industry really could use some consolidation. Here’s hoping it brings a much needed focus on quality (including reliability) and honest to goodness coolness (right now it feels like all firearms come in two colors: scary, or black).

  13. Wrong!
    When one out of every two homes have over 1,000 guns
    Then Maybe…..
    But when the gun grabbers find out then they will
    Pass by their own internal explosion!
    And the World will then be safe for everyone else!
    From Sea to Shinny Sea no Gun Free Zones!
    Heaven and Freedom on Earth……..

  14. Yes, please! Sell off some storied names and IP so that they an give them to someone who gives a crap about quality and will build quality products. The Freedom group has added no value to those brands.

  16. Off topic, but I saw a Sig AR for sale at my local wal mart for 950. Has anyone else seen SIG at Wally World? I was a bit taken aback

    • My local WallyWorld doesn’t sell guns. Either one of them. Does any WW in California sell guns? (They stopped selling when they had a problem with missing guns and incomplete records. That was years ago.)

    • Yeah, see them often.

      Probably the M400, which is the under $1000 Sig AR.

      It’s fairly good rifle for the price.

      • I don’t think we would miss an AR manufacturer or two. How many companies make them and 1911s.
        Now if a company would buy KelTec. Maybe we would see some .22 mag pistols and KSGs on the shelf. Oh and improve quality

  17. Individual companies could master their brands. When there were dedicated gunsmiths making good Marlins, they already had the process down. That is where different models are useful, to give the end consumer more choice.
    Once all of those companies were absorbed, and most of the previous staff fired, they couldn’t even make similar quality guns, let alone bring the same amount of choice.
    Looking only at management issues, I think absorbing brands makes the brand of the old and the buying company worse. They can’t seem to get their act together.
    Would reducing brands work? It might increase quality control. It might help, but I don’t think it’s an ideal situation.

    • So that would suggest that the solution is to build fewer guns at a higher level of quality.

  18. Going to have to disagree with this article.

    Having too much brand choice isn’t a bad thing. It drives innovation and competitiveness. It is one of the corner stones of the free market.

    • Brand choice doesn’t necessarily drive innovation and competition, if most of those brands are owned by just a few large conglomerates. Often, in such cases, it just means the same product with a different label on it. Competing products are discontinued, manufacturing is consolidated, etc… So, lots of brands is good if each brand is controlled by different people. Lots of brands doesn’t mean much if the same people are running the show at all those brands, especially if those people are incompetent (e.g. Freedom Group).

  19. @John L. Mercury still competes with Ford & Lincoln. Just now they go for more crossovers and SUV sales. The brands break down kinda like this:
    Ford baseline affordable stuff (Pinto)
    Mercury lil more luxury more comfy (Pinto with leather seats and chrome trim)
    Lincoln lots of luxury & performance (Pinto with big block power windows heated power leather seats AC chrome wheels & trim)
    There’s a place for all 3 Mercury’s decimation has been due to Ford cutting platforms (Probe, Thunderbird, Crown Vic which in mercury talk is Sable, Cougar, & Grand Marquis)

  20. I think companies should slim down their lines to offer one basic model of every firearm, with a few exceptions.

    Take Ruger for example, God knows how many variations they produce of the 10/22, a gun that many people customize beyond what it starts as. So why.not slim down that line to a Basic Blue/Walnut, Blue/Synth, Stainless/Walnut, Stainless/Synth, then the takedown.

    Then start a custom shop where people can have the gun tweaked and customized by the people who make it, that way the line is basic and understandable but you also make the people who like unique pieces happy.

  21. Personally, I dont care how many brands are out there. As long as entities like the freedom group stop buying brands for the name and then firing everyone that actually knows what their doing. Then turning out absolute garbage after that. I remember when Marlin and Remington were names to be respected, and thats a damn shame.

  22. The firearms out there are ok. This is a mature industry with many solutions made but still looking for the problem.

    TFG is looking for a quick buck, they will end up like the US car industry. Giving away a great product line because they are arrogant. Foreign manufacturers will take a great slice of the pie. Perhaps others will learn from TFG and their BIG mistakes.

  23. I think firearms and firearm companies are unique. I think for a firearm company to be successful they have to be totally devoted to their product and to the customer. By that I mean they have to believe the product is the best one for the customer to purchase not a copy of a good model at a cheaper price. It will be reliable so the customer will live to purchase future products and it will be of good quality so the customer will buy another product because they want to repeat the good experience rather than replace a worn out gun. A successful gun company must believe that, and understand how, manufacturing good firearms will bring financial success. Many of the acquisition groups have a financial goal and the product happens to be firearms. I buy from only two firearms companies. Both companies provide outstanding service.

  24. I don’t care how many different options there are. As long as I have one of each in my safe at home home….

  25. As long as we have a some what free market; that market will determine what the gun companies will provide. and how big a variety.

    The companies that focus on a good reliable product with good service and a good variety to meet customer demand, they will prosper. If they have too many models that become shoddy due to a push to get them out to market, (R51) they will go the way of the dinosaur and the Dodo bird.

    Hear that Remington? Hear that Freedom Group suits?.

  26. If anything get rid of some but expand the lefty market. Interrested in a bolt action left handed stainless rifle with a detachable box magazine? Theres only one. The ruger gunsite scout rifle. And its only available in short action.

  27. Having lots of brand choices isn’t the issue… it’s having them all operate under one umbrella is the problem.

  28. Look at it like this, if Sig keeps core 226, 229 etc… in the best selling configuration price should come down. Put all the others as special order. It is a good pistol but MSRP of $950 for a basic 229 is twice the price of a other brands .40cal even if they are striker fired. If S&W still offered a decent hammer fired semi I’d rather have a 5900 9mm than a Sig 226 9mm
    If you can get a Marlin built just after the FG purchase its still good quality (all the good people were still there). After the first 6-10months is when they ruined the line for most models.

  29. They seem to be following the General Motors business model, have lots of duplication across the board with just enough differences to prohibit interchangeability
    Because that worked out so well for GM..

  30. Hate to say it but, yes, too many different SKUs being needlessly offered; all these companies are trying trying to outdo each other competing for, not just for a piece of the market pie ……… but the whole pie.

  31. Wait, I still need a Ruger Hawkeye Alaskan model in .416,
    A Merkel double in .450,
    An Uberti in 45-90,
    A Ruger .22 mag auto loader,
    A DTA in .338 Lapua,
    A Colt Python 4″,
    A Colt .45 lightweight Commander,
    A Solothurn 20mm….

    There might be one or two others.

  32. Once Cerberus Capital Management — The Freedom Group — is out of the gun business, the problem will be solved.

    In the aftermath of Newtown, Cerberus said that it intended to divest its gun companies. I suspect that the announcement was just a publicity move, especially since TFG’s gun sales crested a billion dollars in the buying panic that ensued.

    Now that sales are “normal” and since TFG whiffed on its government contract bids, the incentive is there for the gun business to be sold off.

    Cerberus Capital’s CEO Stephen Feinberg is a hunter, shooter and ardent Republican. He wanted to buy TFG personally, taking it out of the Cerberus orbit, but financing proved to be problematic. But that was then, when the gungrabbers and wingnuts were crawling out from every compost pile in the country. Now, who knows?

    • The problem is, indeed, Freedom Group and their quest to acquire (and destroy) perfectly good gun companies and names.

      Much of what is wrong with American industry, regardless of the specific sector, is Wall Street. But that’s another story for another time.

      • I was going to start this reply with “In defense of TFG,” but really, there is no defense for TFG, is there?

        TFG is a private equity company that decided to roll up a bunch of gun- and gun-related companies to make huge dollars. Clearly, the execs at TFG, some of whom are fascinated with guns, understood exactly squat about the gun business. They thought that they were smarter than they really are.

        Due to their own hubris, TFG’s execs succeeded in running the component companies down to the point where we think that their products suck and their businesses are failing. As to the first, we are right. Many of the products suck. As to the latter, we may be wrong.

        TFG’s income increased from about $650 million to over $1 billion in one year, and the Remington group is now conservatively valued at about $1.2 billion, which is a lot more than it cost.

        TFG has made the bundle it wanted. I hope it will now get out so that the gun buying public can get back to enjoying Marlin and other debased brands and products.

        • TFG can continue making money with a poorly made product, and Hollywood can keep making money with sh!tty movies. It’s a damn shame, but business will continue as usual until the gravy train stops rolling.

  33. P&G isn’t necessarily talking about killing off brands. Those brands have value. and the MBAs could not possibly accept leaving that money on the table. They’ll sell them off to other companies. My guess is that the new company will knock down the quality an order of magnitude or two, and continue to market it. This, as expected, is a “lose-lose” for consumers; they still have too many choices, but now get screwed with lower quality product.

    Not P&G related, but has anyone drank a Tab soda in the last 30 years, or know anyone who has? It’s still around…

    • I talked with the Coke rep for the local bottler bike week some of the state cops wanted Tab & Fresca. I was told the syrup was for the EU market only now. What area has Tab I need a few 12 packs of it & Fresca.

      • No Tab, but I have a couple 12-packs of Fresca sitting in the kitchen. It’s everywhere in Chicagoland.

        • Thanks got a friend in Henry she’s leaving in a month I’ll have her put a few cases in the U-haul.
          Had an Aunt that put Tab on her corflakes in the 70’s. We thought it was stupid but she lived to 93 on fresca, tab, contac & saccahrin. All the bad stuff might be not so bad.

  34. I think the market is just like water, it will seek it’s own level. If one gun, or car isn’t selling they will drop it. If there is enough consumer demand for a new model, they will produce it.

  35. Until TFG came along, there were not “too many brands.” The American consumer seemed to be able to sort out a Marlin from a Savage from a Remington from a Winchester just fine. There used to be even more “brands” than we have today. We used to have “brands” such as Parker, Fox, Lefever, LC Smith, etc in high end shotguns, as well as lots of cheap utility shotguns. The big gun makers used to have even more brands just to peddle their wares through Sears, Roebuck & Co, Montgomery Wards, JC Whitney and other catalog/retail outlets. Hell, even Winchester peddled their guns through Sears with a slap-on brand name – I think it was “Ted Williams.” Marlin marketed their wares as “Glenfield” when selling guns through JC Penny.

    Sears’ “JC Higgens” line of guns came from, if memory serves, more than a half dozen different actual gun makers – Savage, Winchester, Hi Standard, Savage Fox, Marlin, Mossberg, Stevens, Springfield… I think just about everyone who made guns made some model for Sears under “JC Higgens.”

    For some of us, reading the Sears or JC Penny catalog under the covers at night with a flashlight wasn’t about looking at the women’s underwear section, it was about looking at as much detail as possible on the firearms they stocked in the catalogs and figuring out “who really made that gun?” from careful observation of similar models down to the “real gun store” or the local gunsmith’s shop.

    All these names are gone today, but back then, the consumer navigated the market quite successfully. Maybe the quest for fewer brand names is a result of the overall declining IQ of the American population, thanks to public education and the successful efforts of the National Education Association.

    What we have today are a lot of brands trying to hype fairly insignificant differences between products. Tell me what the difference is between one brand of “mil spec” AR-15 and another? If they both meet “mil spec,” then there really isn’t much, if any, difference. There’s how many companies cranking out AR’s today? The hilarious thing is how few companies are actually making receiver forgings for all these various AR brands, and how many companies are making the various little parts that go into the AR’s. There seems to be Colt (absurdly high priced parts kits)… and then everyone else, with prices that are quite close to each other, meaning that they’re probably coming from the same ultimate source.

    Same deal with cheez-whiz pistols. Most all the striker fired pistols go “bang” – pretty much all of the time. Most of the beefs between one and another striker pistol here on TTAG are about small details – trigger resets, how it feels in your hand, whether it has a wanker rail on it, etc.

    What’s to really differentiate one from another? It sure isn’t the finish on them. The people who think there’s some prestige in owning one black cheez-whiz striker pistol vs. another are deluding themselves. Back when Colt and S&W were at each other’s throats over the revolver market, there was a difference you could immediately see and feel between the two guns: Colts locked tighter and their finish was without equal. S&W was more reliable, a little looser on the lock-up and a bit less expensive – which is why so many police departments went with S&W. Still, there were sound reasons to choose one over another, and if you wanted to own the “top of the market” in handguns, you owned a Colt.

    Today? Meh. One AR-15 or Glock/glock knock-off is just about like any other. Sure, the people who think otherwise are going to give me a ration of crap, but then guys, I probably own more AR’s than you do, so please don’t think you’re telling me what I don’t know already. Sure, some rifles have (eg) phosphated BCG’s, others are chromed and others are nitrided. I run them all. Can’t see much difference in operation to justify the difference in parts cost. If one rifle has a Krieger barrel, OK, that’s worth money over some no-name 1:9 mil-spec barrel, but other than that, there’s just not much difference from one AR to another to support umpteen brands of AR’s. We could lump most all AR production together under one name (Call it “Black Scary Rifles, Inc.”) and peddle a few models in SBR, carbine, mid-length and rifle barrels. For some humor, make a model called the “Fecalator” that promises to make certain busybody women soil themselves at the mere mention of name, and you could sell millions of AR’s under one name. Five models, one company, and you’re done.

    For TFG, eliminating some brands is probably what they’re going to do, and since it appears they’re going to ride the train all the way to Stupidville and buy the train station once they get there, they’ll probably do something like eliminate the Dakota name and roll it into Remington’s “custom shop,” thinking that “well, after all, we still own the Parker name and people can still techincally order a Parker through Remington…”

    • Damn, did I enjoy that comment! DG, it is my heartfelt request that you never, never stop commenting, ever.

    • DG,
      Great post! It brings back really old memories, Like looking through the Stoeger catalog back in the late 40’s
      It was the same thing with outboard motors. A lot of stores had their own brand, but were made by companies like Gale Products.

    • My groups in darkness with a TLR-S mounted on a “wanker rail” are significantly tighter than with a cigar hold of a Olight / Surefire or with a full-sized Streamlight SL-20 police flashlight in a modified weaver stance. Many of those cheese-whiz guns will eat modern JHPs much better than the ubiquitous 1911, and for a much lower price.

      Other than that, I don’t see epic differences between Glock / M&P / XD striker guns, and couldn’t argue any other particular point. I definitely the the decline of Remington, Marlin, and the general cheapness of most modern guns.

    • Epic comment DG.
      I got lost down memory lane. I had a “Revelation” bot rifle in .243 in the 70’s. It was sold through Western Auto hardware stores. I always wondered who made that rifle.

      • That brand name was used to market rifles & shotguns made by Mossberg, Marlin, Savage and Stevens. Without seeing the rifle or knowing the model number, I can’t tell you more. Just as with Sears, Wards, JC Penny, etc – none of these retailers made their own guns. The guns that the retail chains sold might have been a “cheaper” version of the gun companies’ named guns (eg, the Glenfield versions of a Marlin would have cheap or no checkering on them, maybe the blue job would be a bit rougher), but the actual innards of the action/barrel/etc were identical to the marquee version.

  36. As best as I remember my old Marketing class, multiple brands put out by a company are meant to dominate shelf space with its company’s products, leaving less space for the other company’s stuff.

    • That was the theory before they started buying up all the competition. Take for example Dollar General & Family Dollar merging they both had the same market even stores side by side.
      Food Lion divesting some of the smaller chain groceries when they & BI-LO did the deal.

  37. what the american shooter needs isn’t more brands of the same product (how many AR15 or 1911s) but actual Products! maybe we can get the 94 back? make marlins not suck again? or savage could make the 99 again that would be awesome. i say all this because the 30-30 is still one of the best selling rifle round out there.

    • I’m going to resist the temptation to launch into an epic rant here that would amplify your comment.

      You’re right. This is one of my big complaints as well.

  38. Yes there are because of you look at all the AR-15s that are made but a lot of companies, they are function and look the same and some even with same Magpul furniture…there’s really no difference but the price points and whether it’s piston driven or DI. Now that’s not the say the quality of them are the same, but majority of them don’t have any innovative about them…you have other companies that make an AR-15 worthwhile like MGI, Faxon Firearms, Warsport, and many others because of various innovations

  39. Seems companies try to expand on quanitity versus working on quality. If the huge names would just do things right, they wouldn’t have to worry.

  40. Too many companies, too much sameness, way too many versions of the same gun.

    What I want is a better gun than I own now. I want companies to innovate. To bring something unique to the market. But all I see in gun stores are indistinguishable plastic pistols: anonymous, 15 – 19 rounds, flat black, 4″ barrel, and a trigger based safety. They all look like the Glock 19 that was introduced over 30 years ago…

    Actually, that’s a little unfair. The basic design for ‘America’s pistol’ was introduced in 1911. The basic design for ‘America’s rifle’ is over 50 years old…

    I think I’ll stick with my HK P7. That’s only 38 years old.

    • I’m with you.

      Right now, the most innovative design I see out there in real, practical CCW pistols is the Broberg. It is attempting to solve a very real problem in compact CCW pistols – how to get more barrel length, and therefore more muzzle velocity (and as we’ve seen in ShootingTheBull’s videos, more reliable terminal ammunition performance) into a smaller, more concealable package. The Broberg might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but there’s no question that it is a unique, completely new design that is attempting to solve a very real problem in pocket CCW pistols.

      Aside from the Broberg, I see very little out there that is new or innovative. It’s all about making the same idea for less COGS, so as to maximize profits.

    • You won’t ever see any “innovation” from Freedom Group, or from those who worship Procter & Gamble. The cult of Proctor & Gamble is all about buying the innovators of an industry, stripping out the “overpriced fat” of product development & support, sending customer service & support work to India & reducing a company down to a logo and a color of a box.

      Many Americans may no longer remember a former P&G president who went on to be the leader of General Motors – the man who decided that Buicks = Chevy’s with *chrome* moldings, and Pontiacs = Chevy’s with *black* moldings.. Awesome innovation like that sent GM down a path that it still hasn’t recovered from. It was also this leader’s idea to bring back a senile old coot from retirement named Bob Lutz.. Mr. Lutz was an “idea man” who had the idea that GM could save like $2 per car by removing the mirror from the passenger-side sunvisor – when you sell 2 million cars per year, that’s 2 million dollars – how can you lose with an “idea” like that!

      People who know & understand cars should run car companies, people who know & understand the “Oat Bran” business should run those companies, and MBA’s from Wall-street should stick to knocking over old-lady’s pension-funds for fat-stacks of cash. The have no business running companies that actually create a product – like gun companies, car companies or food companies.

  41. I’m pro-market across the board, specifically the rational expectations school of thought. So for me, there’s really no such thing as “too many” brands. Howsoever many brands there are at the moment, that’s how many there should be and will be, until that’s no longer the case. Then there will be a different quantity.

    That’s market-wide, though. For individual firms, product lines will vary in response to and in anticipation of market forces. Some brands become damaged. Others become outdated. Others still become superfluous. Meanwhile, others emerge, catch on, take off. It’s all part of what our friend ol’ Joe Schumpeter termed the creative destruction of capitalism.

  43. Bucket list:
    -Winchester 73 in 357/38 special NEW
    – Beretta M9
    – IwI Tavor
    – Winchester 94 takedown in 32Win Spl (OLD)
    – SKS (old)
    – 2.23 70 Win
    – ruger scout M77

  46. A lot of the companies that P&G is departing from, they are selling to others, letting them buy their self out and run independently, Lots of them are going to be flat out dropped in the states, some are going to survive on in foreign markets.

  47. Have you ever thought of submitting regular articles DG? One of the best comments ever on TTAG.

    • Dan and RF have asked me to contribute articles (several times), but I really don’t have the time to do the job justice at this time. I know that this is an unsatisfactory reason for many, but I’d rather not write at all than submit something that looks shabby and half-assed.

      Good writing takes time, and laying out technical information (such as I’d want to do) will take even more time, plus some s/w that enables me to put together articles with technical drawings, photographs, graphs, possibly spreadsheets and all that sort of stuff in a bundle. I come from the days when we did drafting with T-squares, drafting machines, pencils, ink nib pens, etc, not AutoCAD or something similar. Many of the digital technical drawing programs invariably frustrate me because they take longer for me to competently draw something technical than if I sat down at a drafting board and whipped up a drawing the old-school way.

      I’ll need to examine some digital publishing packages to see what looks good for putting stuff out in both HTML5/XML as well as e-book formats (and .pdf). There’s no point in writing content multiple times for difference presentation models – I’d like to write/format stuff once, and have the software “just make it happen” as far as the output formatting.

  48. Who cares.

    CNC + 3D printing will eventually eliminate the need for most of these manufacturers.

    I know that sounds pie in the sky now. Think 10 years from now.

  49. Kel-Tec needs to remove some options from their product list. They lack the manufacturing abilities to make more than 5 of each model a year…

  51. Mossberg. Lines,models.submodels and then options within submodels. Puruseing their website is like drilling for oil.

  52. All pistols should have the following;
    CZ frame
    1911 trigger
    Glock magazine, trigger safety, sights
    XDM takedown lever, capacity
    Offered in striker, DAO, SA, or DA/SA versions.
    Any caliber .380 – 10mm Auto.
    Sub compact, compact, full size/ duty, competition.

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