Shownotes
Faxon Firearms didn't set out to build guns. Bob Faxon explains that the company came out of a manufacturing family that had been machining since he and his brother were teenagers, and it pivoted toward firearms only after work dried up about twelve years ago. Bob's first trip to SHOT Show humbled him out of the AR15 plan. Months later, watching a Discovery Channel top-ten battle rifles countdown with his two boys, he got upset when the AK beat the AR, sat down at the kitchen table, and drew up the ARAC in twenty minutes. That upper, which combines elements of the AK and AR onto any AR15 lower, became the way Faxon broke into the industry, and learning to make its barrels turned into a dominant part of the business.
The conversation runs deep on how Faxon actually makes things. Bob and Dustin Wallace walk through why button rifling works for them once paired with an in-house stress relieving process, why the whole barrel matters and not just the rifling, and how rapid prototyping lets them run a new suppressor iteration every two to three days. They detail the new suppressor lineup announced at SHOT Show, including the three-sided Basilisk design built to add cross sectional volume without rising into the sight line, plus the engineering tradeoff of reducing back pressure without raising noise. They also cover how aftermarket pistol barrels get chosen, from dealer and customer surveys to partnerships like the 338 ARC work with Hornady and the Gray Guns SIG barrels.
The back half turns to the Soapbox. Dustin lays out the marketing catch-22 firearms companies live in: no Google Ads, posts pulled for no clear reason, and whole accounts taken down, which pushes them toward organic reach and partners like Forge Relations. Bob argues firearms manufacturers are treated as second-class businesses despite the freedoms that gun makers helped defend. Kaylee presses the point that platforms want a publisher's power without a publisher's responsibility. Bob closes on what he calls the fellowship of firearms: most rounds are fired in fellowship with family and friends, first-time shooters almost always walk away smiling, and the strongest case for the Second Amendment is letting people experience it for themselves. The episode wraps with the Pump ARAC story, the SHOT Show suppressors, and where to find Faxon at GOALS in Knoxville.
Links
Questions this episode answers
How did Faxon Firearms get its start, and what role did the ARAC play?
Faxon came out of a machining family that pivoted to firearms about twelve years ago when other work dried up. Bob Faxon designed the ARAC, an upper that blends AK and AR elements onto any AR15 lower, and that product is what broke the company into the industry.
Why did Faxon choose button rifling, and what makes their barrels accurate?
Faxon uses button rifling paired with an in-house stress relieving process that makes the method work consistently for them. Bob stresses that the whole barrel matters, not just the rifling, summed up as it taking everything to make a barrel right and only one thing to make it wrong.
What goes into Faxon's new suppressor lineup and the Basilisk design?
Faxon announced a new suppressor lineup at SHOT Show, using rapid prototyping to iterate every two to three days. The three-sided Basilisk is built to add cross sectional volume without rising into the sight line, while balancing the tradeoff of reducing back pressure without raising noise.
How does Faxon decide which aftermarket pistol barrels to make?
Faxon picks aftermarket pistol barrels using dealer and customer surveys, plus partnerships such as the 338 ARC work with Hornady and the Gray Guns SIG barrels.
What marketing problems do firearms companies face that other consumer brands don't?
Dustin Wallace describes a catch-22: firearms companies can't run Google Ads, have posts pulled with no clear reason, and have whole accounts taken down. That pushes them toward organic reach and partners like Forge Relations.
Why does Bob Faxon say gun makers are treated as second-class companies?
Bob argues firearms manufacturers are treated as second-class businesses despite the freedoms that gun makers helped defend. The hosts add that platforms want a publisher's power without a publisher's responsibility.
What is the 'fellowship of firearms,' and why does Bob think it matters more than the political argument?
Bob's fellowship of firearms is the idea that most rounds are fired alongside family and friends and that first-time shooters almost always walk away smiling. He believes the strongest case for the Second Amendment is letting people experience it for themselves rather than arguing politics.
How did the Pump ARAC come out of the fear that ARs would be banned?
The Pump ARAC is an innovation Faxon developed in response to the fear that semi-automatic ARs could be banned, extending the original ARAC concept. The episode covers this story alongside the SHOT Show suppressors.
Chapters
- 00:16 — Meet Bob Faxon and Dustin Wallace
- 00:18 — Rapid fire questions
- 03:27 — The John Faxon 'leg flu' story
- 06:09 — How Faxon started and the ARAC origin
- 10:06 — Pencil barrels and stress relieving
- 11:29 — Why Faxon went to button rifling
- 15:20 — What's next: the new suppressor lineup
- 20:05 — Designing the Basilisk and balancing back pressure
- 25:36 — How aftermarket pistol barrels get chosen
- 30:48 — Soapbox: the firearms marketing catch-22
- 34:39 — Treated as a second-class company
- 38:35 — Blame the person, not the firearm
- 44:18 — The Pump ARAC and innovating under fear
- 54:02 — The fellowship of firearms
- 1:00:51 — Where to find Faxon and GOALS Knoxville
About the guest
Bob Faxon is the founder of Faxon Firearms, a Cincinnati-based firearms and components manufacturer. He comes from a manufacturing family and has been machining since he was a teenager working for his older brother. In the episode he describes the company's background in defense and weapon systems work, with parts he says have been made for applications on Mars, the ocean floor, and defense missiles. As of last August, Bob is back running the firearms side of the business, with a stated goal of building a great company that leans hard on innovation. He designed the ARAC upper receiver, the product that brought Faxon into the firearms industry. He appeared alongside Dustin Wallace of Faxon Firearms.
Key quotes
"So I got mad, sat at the kitchen table and 20 minutes later I drew up the A rack." — Bob Faxon
"it takes everything to make it right. It only takes one thing to make it wrong." — Bob Faxon
"Firearms have not changed. They weren't bad then, they aren't bad now." — Bob Faxon
"the first step in gun ownership is taking personal responsibility for that firearm." — Kaylee
"when you stop innovating, when you stop growing, you start dying." — Dustin Wallace
"The more people we can get involved in our sport and our activity and to use the firearms in the constructive manner that they're meant to be, they'll get an emotional wave." — Bob Faxon
Transcripts
Welcome to Gun Owners of America State of the second podcast.
Speaker A:I'm Kaylee.
Speaker B:And I'm John.
Speaker B:And today we're joined by two patriots, Bob Faxson and Dustin Wallace from Fax and Firearms.
Speaker B:Guys, thank you for making the trip down here.
Speaker B:Really appreciate it.
Speaker C:Glad to be here.
Speaker C:Thank you.
Speaker D:Pleasure.
Speaker D:Our pleasure.
Speaker B:So we'll go into our first segment.
Speaker B:That is rapid fire.
Speaker B:We're going to ask you guys five questions.
Speaker B:You answer them as quickly or slowly as you want.
Speaker B:This is just a fun kind of quick response.
Speaker B:So the first question I have for you all is who goes first?
Speaker C:I need to know.
Speaker B:We'll go.
Speaker C:Is it here, man?
Speaker B:Bob, first you're.
Speaker B:You're more important.
Speaker B:You know, I don't know about that,.
Speaker C:But I'll take it.
Speaker D:I'm here for moral support.
Speaker D:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker D:Go ahead.
Speaker B:All right, Bob, because this is a Bob question, but Dustin, you can answer.
Speaker B:What is your favorite manufacturing process?
Speaker C:Integrx Multi Axis Mil turns.
Speaker C:Was that too nerdy?
Speaker B:No, that's perfect.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker D:Also Integrex Multi Axis Mil turns.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker D:That's the new hotness on our floor.
Speaker A:If you could go back in time and change history, what are you changing?
Speaker C:I would have served.
Speaker C:That would be my one change.
Speaker D:If I would have gone back in time and changed history.
Speaker D:Oh, I'll double down or I'll get into a vortex.
Speaker D:You know the Back to the Future trilogy.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker D:Okay.
Speaker D:I would have gone back and totally cut back to the future too.
Speaker D:That was garbage.
Speaker D:It goes one, three, two.
Speaker B:Is that.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker D:I would go back in time and I would tell Rob Zemeckis and Steven Spielberg is like, nah, redraft that completely.
Speaker D:I would or at least redo it.
Speaker D:I think it was lame.
Speaker D:It was a little comic booky.
Speaker B:I mean, three was perfect.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker D:They're out west.
Speaker D:They turn a freight train into a time machine.
Speaker D:That's great.
Speaker D:That's excellent cinema.
Speaker D:Good.
Speaker C:We've lost half our audience.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:There we go.
Speaker B:What is your go to home defense gun?
Speaker C:You know, I obviously like a pistol and believe it or not, 12 gauge.
Speaker C:I like 12 gauge and of course keep an A rack.
Speaker C:So I'm biased on that.
Speaker C:Actually, not just one.
Speaker C:Really.
Speaker C:That would be too difficult of an answer.
Speaker D:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker D:Generally it's.
Speaker D:It's a handgun.
Speaker D:I mean, when I. I know, like growing up, like, it was always shotguns in the house.
Speaker D:Like shotguns was always the.
Speaker D:The home defense weapon.
Speaker D:But generally for me, it's a pistol.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Because it depends.
Speaker C:Like, home farm.
Speaker C:Different places, different things, different thoughts.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:What's your last impulse buy?
Speaker D:Oh, geez.
Speaker C:Anagrax.
Speaker C:That's actually true.
Speaker D:Last impulse buy.
Speaker D:Tickets to opening day.
Speaker C:Oh.
Speaker B:Red's opening day is Thursday.
Speaker B:Is like a tradition.
Speaker B:They're the first ones to open the season.
Speaker D:They used to.
Speaker D:They took that away from them a couple of years ago, which kind of stinks because obviously the first professional, you know, baseball team.
Speaker D:But.
Speaker D:Yeah, I've never been, you know, but my wife grew up in Cincinnati and she's always gone, said we should go.
Speaker D:And so I've had to pay some scalper prices for tickets because they were already sold out, so.
Speaker B:All right.
Speaker B:So I'm being told that I need to ask something funny.
Speaker B:So I used to work at Faxon.
Speaker B:I've said it multiple times.
Speaker B:What is a funny story you can tell about John F. Axon?
Speaker D:Dude, I asked earlier.
Speaker D:I asked earlier.
Speaker D:There were some pre flight notes that I wanted to.
Speaker D:I wanted to get going.
Speaker D:John had something that we called the leg flu.
Speaker D:And I don't know really what it was.
Speaker D: st gotten back From Shot Show: Speaker D:And of course, everybody's getting sick and a certain amount of people are testing positive for Covid or whatever.
Speaker D:And something with your immune system was like, you know what?
Speaker D:I'm gonna attack your joints.
Speaker D:So poor Johnny boy coming into my office with a cane.
Speaker D:He rocked it, though.
Speaker B:I kind of walked for like two weeks.
Speaker B:It was so bad.
Speaker D:And so it's.
Speaker D:It comes up every once in a while.
Speaker D:You're eating lunch.
Speaker D:Hey, remember when John had the leg flu?
Speaker D:Yeah, that was sweet.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker D:So the John Farner leg flu stuck in the old cranium.
Speaker C:You got one Bo Mine tags on it.
Speaker C:I don't think I've ever told you this, but you remember I drove you home that night.
Speaker C:You couldn't drive your car.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker C:I thought it was pathetic.
Speaker C:I thought you could have driven your car.
Speaker C:Just, like, drive the freaking car.
Speaker C:But we drove you home because you couldn't drive the car because you had your leg and canes and stuff.
Speaker C:And so we drove him home.
Speaker C:But the whole way I'm going.
Speaker C:You could have driven.
Speaker C:I could have driven.
Speaker B:I could have driven.
Speaker C:You could have driven.
Speaker B:Your amazing wife told me I wasn't allowed to drive and that you were driving me home.
Speaker D:Yeah, she walked him into my office.
Speaker C:All right, when I get back, I'll let her know.
Speaker C:No, that was funny.
Speaker D:Do what you got to do.
Speaker C:Good times.
Speaker B:I also was driving a stick shift at that time, in my defense.
Speaker B:So there Was that in my defense?
Speaker B:Well, that is rapid fire questions, Kaylee, like most Americans, you have a savings account, right?
Speaker A:I do.
Speaker B:Do you have an ammo savings account?
Speaker A:I also do.
Speaker B:And is that through Ammo Squared?
Speaker A:It is, and I've had it for over two years.
Speaker B:Ammo Squared is the only website where you can purchase ammo a little bit at a time and then get it shipped directly to your door.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:I have a little bit of money that goes in every month, and then I can divide what percentage of that money is used for what calibers of ammo, and then all of a sudden hit a thousand rounds and get shipped to my door.
Speaker B:Well, what if I don't want one of the 70 calibers they have available?
Speaker A:You get to pick and choose, and you can even adjust the mounts so that you can hit your target goals faster.
Speaker B:Well, what if I don't want that ammo anymore?
Speaker B:Can I switch it?
Speaker B:Can I get my money back?
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker A:It's really easy.
Speaker A:And I always like to see the graph fill up at the end of every month.
Speaker B:So where do I go to get such an awesome service?
Speaker A:Go to Ammo squared dot com.
Speaker B:Get it.
Speaker B:Now start your ammo savings account at Ammo squared dot com.
Speaker B:Bob, I've known the story since I started at fax and go ahead and let the people know how the story goes, how fax and started.
Speaker B:It's a.
Speaker B:It's one of my favorite stories.
Speaker B:And then go ahead and dive into the.
Speaker B:The Arac too.
Speaker C:Okay, well, you know, the Arac is so intertwined with why it started or how the company started.
Speaker C:Obviously, our manufacturing goes back to when my brother and I were 13 and 15 years old working for our older brother at the time.
Speaker C:And so our machining pedigree goes way back.
Speaker C:But when around the time, 12, 13 years ago, there wasn't a lot of work for manufacturers, and we were having trouble finding work.
Speaker C:So our goal was to find a product.
Speaker C:And of course, AR15s was pretty common for manufacturers to divert into manufacturing rifles.
Speaker C:So we wanted to follow that, that path.
Speaker C:But when I went to Las Vegas for the shot show, which is the first time I'd ever been there, probably about 15 years ago now, 15, 16 years, I didn't understand the magnitude of the industry.
Speaker C:And I went out there with maybe a very overinflated ego, thinking, hey, we can dominate this.
Speaker C:But when I saw the show and the different manufacturers, I was incredibly humbled and I realized that the quality of a lot of the products was so good and for us to try to enter the industry at that point, I didn't think we could pierce it.
Speaker C:I thought it would be a very difficult challenge.
Speaker C:So we backed off that, that effort about six months later.
Speaker C:I was watching Discovery Channel with my two boys at the time and they were doing the all time top 10 battle rifles.
Speaker C:And of that after the commercial break was the AR and the ak.
Speaker C:And of course the AK was rated number one in that show and for various reasons that were hard to really argue in certain cases.
Speaker C:So I got very upset because in our business at that time we were working with defense and weapon systems.
Speaker C:And I said, you know, we've never sat in a room trying to develop second best anything for the, for the warfighter.
Speaker C:So I got mad, sat at the kitchen table and 20 minutes later I drew up the A rack.
Speaker C:And the A rack was the way that we could potentially pierce into the firearms industry.
Speaker C:And our company is really based on innovation, quality and service, but innovation specifically.
Speaker C:And so the ARAC was an opportunity to objectively take beneficial components of the AK and the ar, put them together into an upper receiver that would fit on any AR15 lower.
Speaker C:So the challenge was to create the best of both.
Speaker C:And so the ARAC was the way that we started the company.
Speaker C:And then of course when we made the gun the upper, one of the things I've always been an advocate of is vertically integrated and internally manufacturing components.
Speaker C:I'm not a big outsourced person, so making the Arac, we had to learn how to make barrels.
Speaker C:So barrels was a byproduct of building an A rack upper.
Speaker C:And then as it turned out, the barrels became very popular and became a dominant part of the business over time.
Speaker C:So right now we're actually diverting back.
Speaker C:And as of last August, I'm now back running firearms.
Speaker C:So there for a while I was in our other business that we do other other things and, and I was away from firearms for a little bit.
Speaker C:So I'm back there now and expect to, to help the team.
Speaker C:So my goal now is not to actually go back and be the lead of the company, but to help the people who run the company and, and hopefully use some of my experience, if it helps, to get them into a position where they do a great job of running a company.
Speaker C:And when I went back, they were joking as what is your goal?
Speaker C:Cause typically I'm a very growth oriented corporate kind of driver and that usually is just numbers.
Speaker C:But in this case going back after the few years I've been away, I said the only really goal I have now Is we're going to make this a great company.
Speaker C:That's it.
Speaker C:Size, revenue, all of those things are byproducts.
Speaker C:But we're going to focus on the team, the people, and making a great company.
Speaker C:And we're going to really emphasize the innovation, which over the past few years, I think we maybe didn't put enough energy and effort into that.
Speaker C:I think we should have so started out by just going to the ars, realized that wasn't a path, watched the TV show, got upset, drew up a new gun in 20 minutes.
Speaker C:We were shooting it within a year.
Speaker C:That got us into the firearms business.
Speaker C:And then from there we've expanded in various ways.
Speaker B:Yeah, and some of the products that you've really brought in that are innovative, you've got the Muzlock device and then the integrated comp barrels, the 14, 5 to 16 compare or muzzle device barrel, sorry, not comp.
Speaker B:Those were some of my favorite products.
Speaker B:And then the pencil barrels, that too.
Speaker B:You know, a lot of people had tried to do that and you guys have succeeded on making one of the best pencil barrels that have hit the market ever.
Speaker C:You know, that was, that was the technical side of things we identify in the industry.
Speaker C:I would say our pedigree is we're not as much gun people as some other companies may be, but what we do have is a very strong manufacturing background.
Speaker C:Very strong.
Speaker C:So we've made parts that are on Mars, we've made them on the ocean floor, defense missiles, you name it.
Speaker C:So manufacturing is a pretty good strength of ours.
Speaker C:But what was interesting is the stress relieving process is probably key, and we do that in house.
Speaker C:As I mentioned, we're very big on vertical integration.
Speaker C:So developing the recipe or the thermal process for the stress relieving is a major factor for a pencil barrel, not stringing physics and size.
Speaker C:The barrel is going to grow, the group's going to grow, that that's going to happen.
Speaker C:It's physics.
Speaker C:Physics never runs out of batteries.
Speaker C:I always tell people.
Speaker C:But as far as having it go off, point of aim and a string, that's something we think we can mitigate through stress relieving.
Speaker C:And so far it seems to be very effective.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And the other thing that, you know, I remember coming in when I first started, you know, cold hammer forge was a big thing.
Speaker B:You know, cut rifling was a big thing.
Speaker B:You guys decided to go to button rifling.
Speaker B:You know what, what made you guys go that route as well?
Speaker B:Because that, that in itself was not as common as it is now today.
Speaker C:Well, you know, at the beginning, capital investment of a GFM barrel is much higher.
Speaker C:We had a piece of equipment that we had converted over to do what we would call a very good job in the button rifling.
Speaker C:And when we developed a stress relieving process, which is probably the only handicap that you really see in button rifling, I think that that worked out very well.
Speaker C:So we actually are playing with some other things right now.
Speaker C:But you know, button rifling can be very effective.
Speaker C:And what I would say is when you talk about good and bad of different processes, you know, a good button rifle can beat a bad other process in certain cases.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:So if it's done right, I think it's a very good process.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker D:And I do think some people forget too that button rifling is, you know, a cold forging style process.
Speaker D:Right.
Speaker D:You're not, it's a cold working process.
Speaker D:It's a cold working process and you know, it's, you're not, you know, cutting away material like, you know, single point cut rifling.
Speaker D:Obviously it's not cold hammer forging and in some regards, cold hammer forging can be a more economical stance.
Speaker D:But it's the, the machining, the machine that it takes to do that work, you know, is very different.
Speaker D:But also do like that machining talked about that they first con to do rifling.
Speaker D:Having that machine at our disposal also helped us, you know, do the 1 in 3 twist for 86 blackout and do all those things because it's just, it has capabilities beyond being a rifling machine.
Speaker D:Right.
Speaker D:So now we know how to do those in more modern machines as well.
Speaker D:But it also becomes like a nice test bed for, you know, more boutique items and things of that variety.
Speaker D:So.
Speaker D:Yeah, and by the time you put through all the air gauging, by the time you put through all the other quality checks that we do, the cmms, the marsh shafts, all that sort of stuff, you know, a good barrel is a good barrel and, and John, you could attest to it.
Speaker D:So we have no pro shooters at the shop, you know what I mean?
Speaker D:Like, so when we go out and test and, and you go, if, if, if Dustin could hit, you know, you know, sub MOA 300 yards and maybe this is okay, you know, that those are some of the things that I think too that are helpful.
Speaker D:It's not like we're hiring in snipers, you know, from the marines to come in and test the product.
Speaker D:It's your general guy, you know, your enthusiast, you know, can, can you make that sing.
Speaker C:You have to remember too, the rifling process is very important, but it's only one piece of the barrel.
Speaker C:So when you look at how you process that barrel, how you turn it, how you chamber it, the way you stress relieve it, things that you do to that barrel other than just the rifling are just as critical.
Speaker C:So when we talk about a product, it takes everything to make it right.
Speaker C:It only takes one thing to make it wrong.
Speaker C:So there's a lot of other components to coming up with what we think is a quality barrel, or in this case, maybe rolling a barrel into a rifle or a firearm.
Speaker B:I can't attest that they have no pro shooters.
Speaker B:There is a video of me out there shooting that Dustin took.
Speaker B:Very goofy video.
Speaker B:But yeah, we have, we have plenty.
Speaker C:Of time to point out that cameraman did survive.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker D:Oh, that was a funny story I could have told you.
Speaker D:Blew up one of the cameras.
Speaker D:That was a good one.
Speaker B:I did blow up one of the cameras.
Speaker D:We were shooting rimfire content, but then we decided to switch to a 762A rack.
Speaker D:Didn't really think about that.
Speaker D:And it was on a little stand and it just enough energy made it go.
Speaker D:So you didn't actually dart the camera.
Speaker C:But I brought that invoice with me.
Speaker D:Yeah, that six year old DJ statue of liberation.
Speaker B:Not up on the.
Speaker D:It was good times.
Speaker A:So you've talked a lot about, you know, the people and the process and obviously, you know, we're all big fans of your product.
Speaker A:But as you continue to grow as a company and as the political landscape seems to be changing, as we see more and more new gun owners join the second amendment community, what do you guys see as kind of next on the horizon?
Speaker C:Well, you can talk about suppressors.
Speaker C:That would be a good thing.
Speaker D:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker D:Shot show.
Speaker D:This year we announced our new suppressor lineup.
Speaker D:You know, that's a shift that, you know, I think the whole industry has seen in the last probably three, four years.
Speaker D:You know, you could probably stretch back further, but with the time, like I know when I first started at fax and you know, there were guys that were like, you know, I ordered the suppressor and, and three to 34 months.
Speaker D:You know, I'll get my paperwork and I'll be, you know, on the road and ready to go.
Speaker D:But the turnaround times for the paperwork and the processing and then all the companies like your silencer centrals, your silencer shops that are really taking a bespoke and white glove approach to people being able to get These products quicker and, and not feel worried about that I missed something.
Speaker D:Did I do this thing wrong?
Speaker D:You know, where do I get fingerprint cards, all that sort of stuff.
Speaker D:So kind of taking out those barriers to entry.
Speaker D:And then also too just like the, the turnaround time, you know, to actually get the product in hand.
Speaker D:Because I think that's what turns some people off.
Speaker D:One is knowing there's still a lot of people who think they're illegal everywhere all the time, I think.
Speaker D:So that's one thing and I know there's a lot of outlets that are educating people on that.
Speaker D:And I think the second one is like, well, how do I do it and how do I do it properly?
Speaker D:And I feel like there's a lot more resources, you know, for that right now.
Speaker D:But, you know, we see it as in everything that we do, we want people to feel like they're getting more than what they paid paid for.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker D:We are always a high value proposition brand in all of our products that they're getting something that's lifetime guarantee.
Speaker D:That's a made in the US you could point it on the map and say there's Facts and firearms in Cincinnati, right.
Speaker D:And the same thing goes for, for the suppressors.
Speaker D:And I think that one, that'll be a change in our, you know, business because this will be a, you know, a different business segment for us, somewhere where we haven't played.
Speaker D:But I think a lot more people have a lot more interest in, in it and they're, they're building their ars, they're building up the guns because they want to be able to shoot suppressed.
Speaker D:And so I think that's been a big change.
Speaker D:Now I know that there are, I think there was stuff this week, right, that came out about saying, you know, is the ATF going to continue recognizing suppressors as firearms and vice versa.
Speaker D:So I mean, you never really know.
Speaker D:I mean, everybody kind of thought that we knew what the shakedown was on pistol braces two years ago and then that all changed and then changed back again.
Speaker D:So those are things you can't necessarily count on except for the fact that they're likely going to change depending on what the cultural impulse is at the moment.
Speaker D:But I think that it is something, you know, very cool that more people are getting interested in and that there's, you know, other companies, including ourselves, that are bringing unique offerings to it.
Speaker D:You know, this isn't just your solvent trap, you know, can, you know, there's some really high science going on in there.
Speaker D:And in our case, you know, a Bunch of intellectual property and stuff that's going into it that I think is super unique and I think just making the, making the industry more rich, you know, making the shooting sports more rich.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:At shot show I got to see the cans firsthand and I looked at him and I was like, this is insane.
Speaker B:And I heard, I'm not going to out you guys on where you got engineers from it, but I've heard the technology that's going into this is something that we've never seen before.
Speaker D:Yeah, I mean a lot of these ideas came, you know, internally.
Speaker D:Now we, we reached out to do, you know, to get some help on the actual 3D printing.
Speaker D:You know, we, we have basically four families of, of suppressor.
Speaker D:There's two that are traditionally manufactured that just happen at our facility and then two that are 3D printed out at Inconel.
Speaker D:And.
Speaker D:But obviously with Bob's background and the defense side of the world and kind of knowing what these materials are capable of and which ones would be, you know, good to run down a path and which ones may not fit and also finding like, you know, where is that missing piece, you know, in the market.
Speaker D:So if we're talking about back pressure cooling or, or venturi effects or how they mount, there's all these little ancillary parts, you know, that, that go along with it.
Speaker D:But yeah, it's all very fascinating.
Speaker D:I mean, do you want to talk.
Speaker D:I would love for you to talk a little bit about, you know, the Trilobe design and how we're some of the unique features that are going to be in that.
Speaker C:You know, it's fun when you go about trying to design or create something.
Speaker C:And usually what I like to do is start at a very high level and look at certain basic elements.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And then as the evolution occurs, you can refine the details of the components.
Speaker C:So for example, in the Basilisk, those are nice.
Speaker C:I hate that name.
Speaker C:But Basilisk, we'll get there in a second.
Speaker C:Yeah, but anyway, so the Basilisk Harry Potter fans like it's three sided.
Speaker C:But what we wanted to do initially was to create a different profile so that you had more cross sectional area per linear inch of suppressor.
Speaker C:So again, physics is always, always physics.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:Never changes.
Speaker C:So volume is a component of a suppressor and being able to increase the volume without increasing the length and impeding a line of sight or getting up close to that line of sight really lend itself initially.
Speaker C:And this is one of the things we put down a list of things that we wanted our suppressor to be able to do or to be capable of.
Speaker C:And volume of course, one the sides.
Speaker C:We didn't want to go up above the sight line and into that.
Speaker C:We want to increase the cross section per linear inch.
Speaker C:We wanted multiple chambers and passages.
Speaker C:We have some cooling features that we're still testing and working through.
Speaker C:But there was a lot of high level things.
Speaker C:And then to actually define the product, the product, there was software utilized for flow and then we used a physical flow bench where we benchmarked industry took ours for back pressure through flow and then we took it to the field and used sound equipment to test the decibel.
Speaker C:So the effectiveness you typically, it's great taste or less filling.
Speaker C:You're usually balancing one against the other.
Speaker C:So one of the major issues for our suppressors was to reduce back pressure, but yet that typically will increase noise.
Speaker C:So the technology that was inside of there was developed through software.
Speaker C:It was simulated in plastic on a flow bench to validate some of the parameters.
Speaker C:And we could do that every two days to three days and run an iteration.
Speaker C:And then when you got to a point we wanted to test it.
Speaker C:You could print it in inconel or metal.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:You'd make an actual shootable one.
Speaker C:Then you could take that back pressure, the through flow and then actually go out and do decibel and compare that.
Speaker C:So the rate of development was rapid.
Speaker C:It was every two, three days was another revelation or revision of the design.
Speaker C:So that, that was kind of interesting.
Speaker C:But you know, what you don't want to do is you don't want to lose track of the initial things.
Speaker C:You want this to be the objectives that you set, like a threshold objective or a goal.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:So you set what you want it to do, then you, you leave those alone and you tweak the balance to make that happen.
Speaker C:And that's where the smart people come into play.
Speaker C:That's where software and iterations and testing and validation come in.
Speaker C:So I think we went through a pretty extensive.
Speaker C:It was a very short term, very quick pace, but there was a tremendous amount of evolutions or revisions within that.
Speaker D:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker D:And some of the stuff they'd bring in, they'd be like, hey, we have suppressor parts today.
Speaker D:We're like cool.
Speaker D:They bring them into the office.
Speaker D:I'm like, what in the world is that?
Speaker D:You know, because it looks so crazy, but there's stuff that you can do.
Speaker D:Like Bob had mentioned some of the new machines we're getting on the floor even for the traditionally manufactured stuff.
Speaker D:Typical cup and tube design.
Speaker D:Suppressors.
Speaker D:Right.
Speaker D:Your normal baffle stacks like to be able to rapid prototype those.
Speaker D:Being able to what would take a couple of weeks to get maybe an iteration or two done, we have trays of them by the time lunch is over.
Speaker D:Those types of things are huge.
Speaker D:I think the agility in this market is such a big thing because everybody's innovating, you know what I mean?
Speaker D:Everybody who's anybody's paying attention to is innovating and they're doing.
Speaker D:Trying to make something unique under the sun.
Speaker D:And so we, you know, we want to try to make sure that we continue that as part of our trademark and the quality, innovation and service there has to be that innovative piece.
Speaker D:And I think right now a lot of that is how quick could you come to something or come to market with something that is still of the quality pedigree, you know, brand.
Speaker C:When you talk about product development or evolution of your current product line, it's always a constraint of resources, right?
Speaker C:So when you can facilitate a shop with equipment and technology that allows a lesser amount of investment and time to create or to improve something, then by definition you can do more within a year.
Speaker C:So when the background in manufacturing, like I said, is fairly extensive and other aspects that I've been involved with, we literally look at and try to factor in what will be the factory of the future.
Speaker C:How will you deal with labor issues, how will you deal with tolerances not at cost?
Speaker C:And how can you rapidly develop prototypes?
Speaker C:How can you reduce the cost, the time and the resources necessary to get something to market?
Speaker C:And that is where I have spent the last several years aggressively involved in, and now back being involved with firearms.
Speaker C:We're taking a very aggressive approach there to utilize those type of concepts to be able to bring products not just quicker, but actually better and quicker.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:So it's a fun puzzle to play, actually.
Speaker C:And there's a lot of capabilities out there today that you can leverage for that, those results.
Speaker C:So that, to me is one of the funnest parts of the business is trying to really be great at what you center of excellence, a core competence.
Speaker C:What I try to echo through the building, we want to be a center of excellence at our core competence.
Speaker C:And our core competence is manufacturing.
Speaker C:You can define it into firearms, but it doesn't even need to be so you know that that's what we're striving for.
Speaker B:So I got a fun story, and it goes into a question.
Speaker B:So I know aftermarket barrels for pistols and rifles are a big thing.
Speaker B:And I know before I left, we had a big Meeting on going into what aftermarket barrels we should do next.
Speaker B:I know I said high point barrels.
Speaker B:Dustin looked at me like I had four heads and left me off the.
Speaker D:It'd be a great marketing activity.
Speaker B:Great marketing activity.
Speaker B:But, yeah.
Speaker B:What goes into the decision to make any of the aftermarket barrels?
Speaker B:You do.
Speaker B:I know you guys do.
Speaker B:Shield mmp.
Speaker B:Glock Sig.
Speaker D:Yep.
Speaker B:I'm missing one.
Speaker B:I feel like.
Speaker D:No, that's.
Speaker D:That's pretty much it.
Speaker D:I mean, it's Glock Sig and M and P compact and subcompact.
Speaker D:Now, granted, you know, we've had OEM clients, you know, that reach beyond that.
Speaker D:And, you know, that's another thing when, you know, Bob talks about our manufacturing pedigree.
Speaker D:There's a.
Speaker D:There's a lot of stuff that we do and are able to do or have done in the past or spooling up to do in the future that never really hits the facts and catalog, right?
Speaker D:So, you know, there's.
Speaker D:There's a lot of parts and pieces that, you know, some folks, you know, may not even know, you know, that, which in white label OEM manufacturing, they shouldn't.
Speaker D:Right now.
Speaker D:There's been a lot more people that are more open with it.
Speaker D:You know, Bob's son Robert, you know, works with me and sales and marketing.
Speaker D:And one of our kind of credos is that in the barrel space, we want to be like, if you're a car person, like the Brembo brakes of, of, you know, rifle barrels.
Speaker D:So we do have some people that are, that are very open about saying that our products and their firearms.
Speaker D:So, for example, if you're talking about pistol barrels, you know, Bruce Gray of Gray Guns, we do those, you know, 320 barrels.
Speaker D: He basically builds them like: Speaker D:But yeah, we do all those.
Speaker D: a, you know, we've dipped in: Speaker D:We've done a few other things.
Speaker D:But, you know, what we generally do is we try to listen to the customers and the dealers.
Speaker D:You know, what is the greatest interest?
Speaker D:Where is there a void in the market?
Speaker D:And so the shield barrels were an excellent point because when we came out with our shield barrels, we were one of the first companies to offer a threaded shield barrel.
Speaker D:All right?
Speaker D:So you're just taking an opportunity and putting yourself right there in the, in the thick of it.
Speaker D:Obviously, handguns have a lot of proliferation, right?
Speaker D:So there are certain things to keep in mind with it, but those are generally what we're looking at.
Speaker D:Every year we do year end surveys with all the dealers and try to find some gaps.
Speaker D:We do a lot of customer surveys as well.
Speaker D:You know, take in feedback from reps and you know, every once in a while we'll get a customer who, you know, the reason we have Glock like conversion barrels, like Glock 22 conversion barrels, is because we had a customer who's like, dude, if you would just make these, like, we'd sell at least a few hundred of them, you know, in a couple of months.
Speaker D:So like, well, okay, you know, if you want to sign up and do that and then if we see it's valid, then we'll add it, you know, to the formal catalog.
Speaker D:Or we give the dealer the opportunity to have a certain amount of time of exclusivity on the product if it's something that they want to shake out and we want to shake out.
Speaker D:So there's a few things that, that go into it and sometimes it's, it's requests from other people in the industry.
Speaker D:So, you know, this goes beyond pistol barrels.
Speaker D:But you know, like we're a partner with Hornady on 338 arc.
Speaker D:Obviously we wouldn't know what 338 arc is, but when somebody comes to market with a new cartridge and they want to make sure that it's supported throughout the industry, sometimes it's just, hey, we're doing this cool new thing.
Speaker D:Do you want to be a part of it?
Speaker D:And how those processes and what the engineering looks like, it all depends on what company's coming to you.
Speaker D:But sometimes you never know.
Speaker D:You don't know.
Speaker D:Is this one going to be a ringer or a dinger?
Speaker D:Like you really don't know.
Speaker D:But.
Speaker D:But yeah, a lot of that is industry feedback stuff that we do on OEM that we think we could maybe take another spin on and put it in our own catalog.
Speaker D:And then a lot, a lot of feedback from the dealers and reps. Well,.
Speaker B:Before I forget, Bob, congratulations.
Speaker B:I saw Robert got engaged.
Speaker C:He did.
Speaker B:Congrats.
Speaker B:If you're watching this, congrats, buddy.
Speaker C:We're very excited.
Speaker B:Super excited for you.
Speaker C:We love her.
Speaker C:To Dallas.
Speaker C:She.
Speaker C:She's awesome.
Speaker C:They've been dating since they were 14.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker D:And they're 15 now.
Speaker D:So it's been, it's been a hell of a year.
Speaker C:So we're super excited.
Speaker B:I'm excited for you guys.
Speaker B:Good for him.
Speaker B:If you let him know I said congratulations, I will as well.
Speaker B:Are you looking for a quality pistol at Affordable price.
Speaker B:Check out Dura Arms.
Speaker B:Me Personally, I own two different models from Dura Arms, the DY9 and the Malik.
Speaker B:Both high quality guns coming out of one of the largest manufacturers out of Turkey who has just moved their facility here to the US making USA made guns that are high quality and ready for any situation.
Speaker B:Their DY9 is one of the best shooting guns I've shot in a long time and their Malik copies the Beretta 92 pattern of guns.
Speaker B:Check them out at deraarms.com or check them out at Goals in Knoxville August 9th and 10th.
Speaker A:This segment is from the Soapbox, the part of the show where we handle the spiciest of topics and discuss some of the pain points in the industry, the pain points in legislation and what it takes to overcome those.
Speaker A:So who wants to kick it off with a hot take?
Speaker D:I'll start because I think it's one that we probably with you guys having like a marketing, you know, focus in your roles and sometimes just the marketing end right of firearms.
Speaker D:And it is a catch 22, you know, for example, you know the biggest elephant to point to in the room is like Google Ads kind of run the world and the rest of consumer products, right?
Speaker D:But obviously gun companies can't do that.
Speaker D:Now there are workarounds and there are other agencies and there are other PPC type platforms that you could use but you can't use Google AdWords now at the same time that also becomes a playing field leveler.
Speaker D:Well if I can't do it and that guy can't do it, well now we're both having to get scrappy.
Speaker D:So organic SEO and things like that, more traditional web based marketing is still at play for a company like us.
Speaker D:Whereas on a consumer side and something that's not regulated by a three letter agency, it's how big is your budget.
Speaker D:So your ROI is directly tied to your budget.
Speaker D:Whereas I think there is some more creativity there.
Speaker D:I'll say sometimes one of my biggest challenges though is like the inconsistencies between the social platforms.
Speaker D:That's, that's probably one of my biggest soapbox things, you know, where it'll be like I posted the same thing there and the same thing there.
Speaker D:But here you said it was not allowed but here it was just fine.
Speaker D:You know those, those things always, you know.
Speaker D:But it's a cross section, right?
Speaker D:Because these are private industries and we do believe in private industry.
Speaker D:And so it is a catch 22.
Speaker D:But it does make you get more creative, you know, I would say so finding partner Organizations and other marketing outlets and people like Forge Relations or whomever else that help you combine with other folks.
Speaker D:And so you do have to get scrappy.
Speaker D:But I would say from a day to day, you know, that's normally one that, you know, when I wake up and I get a notification on my phone like, hey, we took that down.
Speaker D:And then we decided to take all 43 of these down that were fine for the last six months.
Speaker D:You know, so that is.
Speaker D:That is a frustrating, frustrating piece for us, especially when we're a valid business.
Speaker D:We're well within the terms and conditions.
Speaker D:And sometimes it's not even the platform.
Speaker D:Sometimes you get brigaded.
Speaker D:Sometimes you get people trying to ransom your account.
Speaker D:But, you know, with bigger growth and bigger audiences and bigger notoriety, the more you become a target to those types of things.
Speaker D:So I wouldn't say it's just limited to firearms.
Speaker D:I'm sure there's other businesses and things that deal with it, but that's generally one of the.
Speaker D:One of the headaches that I just do not like dealing with.
Speaker B:What was it like a year ago?
Speaker B:You guys got your whole account taken?
Speaker D:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker D:Instagram.
Speaker D:We're back.
Speaker B:Yeah, you're back.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker D:Facebook still in jail?
Speaker D:You know, has been for a little while.
Speaker D:I get glimpses of light.
Speaker D:And, you know, we work with people, people who know people and work through, you know, other organizations, you know, such as yourselves, that have people on the inside side and could give insight, you know, to getting those things fixed, because 99% of the time, it's nothing that was actually against the terms and conditions.
Speaker D:You know, there's nobody in our facility that's trying to do anything slimy.
Speaker D:You know, we're.
Speaker D:We understand.
Speaker D:Listen, this is a platform that you, Another business owns, and if we need to play by your rules, we play by your rules.
Speaker D:But don't just throw the baby out with the bath water because, you know, we make guns.
Speaker C:Yeah, I don't really feel that easy about.
Speaker C:Kind of rubs me the wrong way.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:And the fact that people can treat us the way they do, being a firearms company, when really, if you really go back, that's what gave them the freedom that they're using today to penalize us.
Speaker C:Under one of my desks, under the glass, I have a. I did the artwork on this, by the way, but I have a picture of an Iraq and a constitution.
Speaker C:I said, both these defend our.
Speaker C:Our freedom, and both of these defend each other.
Speaker C:And I think about that.
Speaker C:And from commerce, finance, credit cards, banks, advertising is a group of.
Speaker C:It but it goes much deeper.
Speaker C:And when I was a kid, you watched cowboy and Indian movies, John Wayne took Iwo Jima.
Speaker C:I mean there was nothing bad about firearms.
Speaker C:I don't know why firearms are bad now.
Speaker C:Firearms have not changed.
Speaker C:They weren't bad then, they aren't bad now.
Speaker C:But you're treated as a second class company because you manufacture firearms.
Speaker C:And personally I have an issue with that.
Speaker A:Yeah, I mean I definitely feel your pain.
Speaker A:But more importantly, I think the frustration comes where they want to be a publisher but not have any of the responsibility of a publisher.
Speaker A:They're like we're an open forum and anyone can post anything except for when I don't politically align with it and then I'm going to put a separate clause.
Speaker A:And I think this is one of the things that's the hardest for us to message in the two way space is you have a second amendment right whether you choose to use it or not.
Speaker A:I think people have so, especially on the anti gun side, so disillusioned themselves with this fact that well, I'm just gonna take away your gun rights because I don't want a gun or I believe that the police are always gonna be there and there's never gonna be, they're gonna be 20 seconds away when I need them or five seconds away.
Speaker A:They have teleportation devices and none of that's true.
Speaker A:It's like they're minutes away when seconds matter.
Speaker A:And so you have to have the ability to defend yourself.
Speaker A:You, you have a constitutionally protected right to be able to defend yourself and your family, but they don't recognize that they themselves even have that right.
Speaker A:It's all that object scares me and so I want it to disappear.
Speaker A:And that's just not reality.
Speaker A:And, and so it's, it's incumbent upon us on the, the Pro2A side to educate to, you know, take away.
Speaker A:You know we all saw what happened with the Alec Baldwin shooting where it was the gun's fault.
Speaker A:The gun's fault, the gun's fault.
Speaker A:No, it was his fault, he pulled the trigger.
Speaker A:They want to say things, you know, like, well, this mass shooting, well no, it's a mass murder.
Speaker A:The gun was, is what you're focused on, but it was somebody who was evil that is doing evil intent.
Speaker A:And that's the differentiating factor is they want to put all of the ire on the gun and none of it on the individual.
Speaker A:When we all know that the first step in gun ownership is taking personal responsibility for that firearm.
Speaker C:Well, if there was any logic to it.
Speaker C:If you look at the statistics and take away suicides and you take away rifle homicides and you take pistol homicides, why aren't they trying to take all the pistols away?
Speaker C:If they want to keep us safe, then you should be saying, take all the pistols, not the ugly black rifles.
Speaker C:They're not statistically the problem.
Speaker C:So I don't understand the logic of it.
Speaker C:I don't understand the meaning of it.
Speaker C:I think it's simpler to point to a piece of metal and say that's the problem, instead of a more challenging question of where is the mental health of the people that are doing this?
Speaker C:Why is there so much.
Speaker C:When kids used to take a rifle and put it in a gun rack and a pickup truck and drive to school and they never had the issues.
Speaker C:So I think, unfortunately, if you don't focus on the core of the problem, you may feel better, but you're not going to fix it.
Speaker C:The other thing is we're a gun manufacturer, right?
Speaker C:And I should say everybody should own a gun.
Speaker C:And I don't.
Speaker C:And I don't know if this is an unpopular statement, but I think if you want to and you're going to practice and you're going to be responsible, then you should have as many as you want.
Speaker C:I think that right has to be there for people.
Speaker C:And I don't push that.
Speaker C:Everyone should have one.
Speaker C:Some people probably aren't comfortable and maybe they shouldn't actually have a firearm.
Speaker C:But I hope someone around them, if they need them, does have a firearm.
Speaker C:And I hope they practice and train with it and they're responsible with it.
Speaker C:But the other side says, I don't want one, so I don't want you to have one either.
Speaker C:And that really crosses a line to me that that's not the same thing.
Speaker C:If you choose not to have it, I respect that.
Speaker C:But if you're telling me I can't have it, I really have an issue with that.
Speaker C:And that's why I just don't see the.
Speaker C:The argument isn't logical to me at all.
Speaker C:And it doesn't really.
Speaker C:If you want people to be safer, which all of us do, I think you have to look at the core problem, not do something that's superficial, that makes you feel better, but really is not ever going to fix the problem.
Speaker C:And if you think the criminals aren't going to hand in their guns, I think that's the most ludicrous thing I've ever heard.
Speaker C:So I just can't follow the logic of it.
Speaker C:I mean, if this was A perfect world and we could all be totally safe and no one would ever get hurt if everyone turned into fire.
Speaker C:I might even consider it.
Speaker C:I don't know if I'd do it, but I would consider if it could be a perfect world.
Speaker C:But that's not the question and that doesn't exist.
Speaker C:So it's not even close to having that kind of a debate.
Speaker C:And to me it's just, I don't know why people feel that way.
Speaker C:I really don't.
Speaker C:I try to really understand both sides of arguments most of the time.
Speaker C:Honestly, there are questions out there today.
Speaker C:It's debatable who's correct.
Speaker C:But on the second amendment issue, I think with our history, you know, our country's heritage and pedigree, I don't know that that's really a valid argument.
Speaker C:In that case, I don't know why people are saying some of the things they do and to treat us as a second class company because of it.
Speaker C:It's pretty upsetting, to be honest with you.
Speaker C:It's just not fair.
Speaker C:Other people do things that in my opinion would be worse and they're not treated as bad as we are.
Speaker A:Yeah, no, I think that that's a very valid point.
Speaker B:Don't look at me, I got a cough.
Speaker B:Hey, water.
Speaker C:Somebody tell a joke before I get really pissed off.
Speaker B:No, Bob, I want you.
Speaker D:All you got to do, all you got to do is just put wood furniture on the ar.
Speaker A:Man.
Speaker D:That seems, Furniture on the, seems to trick everybody.
Speaker D:I, I can't remember that.
Speaker D:I, I, I don't know.
Speaker D:Do you guys have a Jamie here that pulls things up?
Speaker D:But like, you know, but like the, there was a video that this was, this might have been during pandemic times.
Speaker D:And there was somebody who you know, brought in as like a, a sample piece of evidence or something like, you know, which one is the ar.
Speaker D:And one was like a black, just straight up, like black, like poly shotgun.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker D:And so they're like.
Speaker D:Because the other one was an ar, but it had wood furniture on it.
Speaker D:It's like that's the scary one, you know, the one that's all black's like dog.
Speaker D:That's a pump action shotgun, you know.
Speaker D:And so it's, it's the whole, it's the premise and the optics of it and like it's, and that's where I agree.
Speaker D:There is a piece of this that is just, that thing looks scary to me.
Speaker D:Or I saw that on a movie or this was in a 90s video game that they were playing Shoot up At the arcade, whatever it may be.
Speaker D:But yeah, wood furniture.
Speaker C:For the record, I do like the wood furniture.
Speaker C:I think it looks good.
Speaker A:Yeah, well there's something classy about it, you have to admit.
Speaker D:Yeah, it smells like rich mahogany.
Speaker B:You remember our, our both of our former hometown at one point, Columbus.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker B:NBC4 put up a video of this is what an AR15 does to a watermelon.
Speaker B:And they were shooting a watermelon with a shotgun.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker B:And they're like, look at this out, look how scary it is.
Speaker B:Yeah, that's not an ar, that's a shotgun.
Speaker D:Right?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:They bring this fear mongering in there.
Speaker A:But there's also like this reality that I think is very interesting when it comes to the, the psychological side of even gun owners is we kind of get into our own little bubble of I like this firearm and as long as this firearm isn't being attacked, I'm good.
Speaker A:And I think oftentimes like hunters fall into that category.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Where it's like, well they're, they're not, they're not going to go after my shotgun.
Speaker A:So, so I'm in the clear.
Speaker A:So I don't need to be in the fight because all I do is, is this one, my one lane and it's one of those things where the left is.
Speaker A:The anti gunners are really good at trying to divide us and trying to only go after one thing or one class of firearms or whatever it is because they know that they're probably not going to get all of the gun owners riled up at the same time because they know that they would lose if every gun owner got into the fight at the same time and said no, like you're not doing that, that is unacceptable, that is unconstitutional and we're going to fight back.
Speaker A:And so they cherry pick and they put us together.
Speaker A:And so they think because they're ignorant to firearms that adding wood furniture changes the type of firearm.
Speaker A:And so we're just going to, we're going to divide it out and then they're not going to worry about it.
Speaker A:And it's like, yeah, but it's one of those things where we can't be tricked by their marketing to their people.
Speaker A:To win for their side, we have to be solid.
Speaker B: s because we had this fear in: Speaker B:I Remember, we were sitting there, and that's where the bolt guns came from originally was this fear that they were going to go and what.
Speaker B:What were we going to do as a business?
Speaker B:And the one thing that I'm not gonna talk about that was the most fun I've ever had with a gun.
Speaker B:That prototype you were working on.
Speaker D:Oh, we've taken it to some shows.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker B:The Pump A Rack, that was one of the most fun guns I've ever shot.
Speaker B:I love the.
Speaker B:I loved it because it was different.
Speaker B:It was cool.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker B:But it's.
Speaker B:It's one of those things where innovation came from.
Speaker B:This fear that tomorrow we could be cut off.
Speaker B:The same thing went with the pistol braces.
Speaker B:I was gone by the time the pistol brace thing happened, but same thing with the pistol.
Speaker B:Yeah, the pistol braces.
Speaker B:And then, you know, we had this worry.
Speaker B:And as a manufacturer who.
Speaker B:Whose core component is mostly AR parts, you know, how do you pivot with that fear?
Speaker D:Yeah, I mean.
Speaker D:I mean, bolt action is multifaceted.
Speaker D:Right.
Speaker D:I mean, it's also like you.
Speaker D:I mean, it's.
Speaker D:It's a cliche, but it's true.
Speaker D:Like, when you stop innovating, when you stop growing, you start dying.
Speaker D:Right.
Speaker D:And so there.
Speaker D:There was something there that, you know, as we had done the 86 blackout project and.
Speaker D:And there was such a push and bolt action for that, and we felt there was something that we could add to that market.
Speaker D:But, yes, it ended up having A plus up.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker D:I mean, the.
Speaker D:The Pump A rack was really for, like, New Zealand and Canada.
Speaker D:ARAC was already on the no fly list in Canada.
Speaker D:And so.
Speaker D:But then as time went on, we're like, this might have legs domestically, you know, whether that's a fear thing or whether just because it's different.
Speaker D:And you're right, it's pretty satisfying, you know, to pump action seven six two.
Speaker D:Like, it's pretty dope.
Speaker C:It's a fun gun.
Speaker D:Yeah, it's fun, but it's a fun.
Speaker C:When you shoot it, you smile.
Speaker C:Yeah, I mean.
Speaker B:Oh, I had a smile.
Speaker C:Ear to ear, you know.
Speaker C:I'm sorry.
Speaker D:No, you're good.
Speaker C:No, I was just thinking, you know, that was.
Speaker C:I remember actually when that happened, we went to what we called Friday.
Speaker C:We went out for a Friday and got with all the sales guys, and they were talking about different things and came back and we had this concept to.
Speaker C:To build that.
Speaker C:And the.
Speaker C:A rack is a perfect platform because it's a monolithic upper, so you don't have a handguard, and the rigidity of the system.
Speaker C:Everything really lent itself to be an easy adaptation to a pump action.
Speaker C:As a matter of fact, initially I was going to do everything the same as one, except drill the cross hole between the cylinder of the bore and the cylinder of the piston and say there's a center drill there.
Speaker C:But, you know, if you drill a hole there, you have a semi automatic.
Speaker C:But we didn't do that.
Speaker C:It is it.
Speaker C:We did make the design a pump, but it was.
Speaker C:It was a reaction, I think, you know, one of the things is, I don't.
Speaker C:I don't know that focusing on the negative aspect of the problems and the things that we can't really directly impact, right?
Speaker C:There's big wheels rolling in certain areas, but if they're large in governmental regulations, et cetera, then our leverage is agility and creativity and innovation.
Speaker C:And we have those at our disposal, right?
Speaker C:So instead of complaining about the other things, we do what we can, we're here, et cetera.
Speaker C:But some of those things we don't have a direct impact on, but the other ones we actually have direct impact within our walls.
Speaker C:So what I think is important is focus on the things you can change.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And have impact on it.
Speaker C:So to me, I guess if I think about, I get frustrated, but when I.
Speaker C:When I look at it, it's nothing but another challenge and a puzzle.
Speaker C:And it's like, how do we resolve this?
Speaker C:How do we get around this?
Speaker C:And to me, it's a fun process.
Speaker C:So I kind of focus on the positive side of creating the products.
Speaker C:And you know what?
Speaker C:If things change, we'll change and we'll be more agile and quicker than any governmental agency.
Speaker C:So I would think that we'll continue to be innovative, we'll continue to navigate the landscape.
Speaker C:But I don't ever look at it as bleak from a business standpoint.
Speaker C:The business will be agile and we'll be creative, and we can do many things.
Speaker C:We could even do other industries.
Speaker C:I'm not worried about that.
Speaker C:When you bring up the question of whether you can or can, I think the philosophical question of the United States, the Second Amendment, our pedigree and heritage, our freedom, et cetera, those are really the driving things for that.
Speaker C:I don't really consider in the business.
Speaker C:I don't worry about a threat in the business.
Speaker C:I really don't care.
Speaker C:We make bolt actions.
Speaker C:They're great to shoot.
Speaker C:I love shooting them.
Speaker C:I like the accuracy.
Speaker C:I like the pump action.
Speaker C:You smile.
Speaker C:We left the recoil spring in it, so it actually goes to battery on an empty mag.
Speaker C:And you can release it just like an AR and it'll go.
Speaker C:And when you shoot it, you know, your arm is easier to go this way than it is that way.
Speaker C:So shooting the gun is just a pleasant experience.
Speaker C:So, yeah, I guess the reason you have to do some of these things might be a negative input.
Speaker C:But I don't focus on it.
Speaker C:I don't focus on it from inside the business.
Speaker C:I look at it as another puzzle, another opportunity, another product.
Speaker C:And you know, and so we'll find a solution.
Speaker D:That's how I said, at the end of the day, what are you going to do?
Speaker D:You're going to quit?
Speaker C:I mean, if we know like you can't quit, we do what we can, we vote, we do things like this, we support activities.
Speaker C:So it is important.
Speaker C:But at the end of the day, we have a lot of control on our product development.
Speaker C:And so I don't know, I look at as a challenge in a positive aspect.
Speaker A:Yeah, and I love what you said, you know, what are we going to do?
Speaker A:Quit?
Speaker A:No.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker A:No.
Speaker A:And, and that's the way that we're.
Speaker D:Not in the business of saying yeah.
Speaker A:And so I love that because, you know, there's a lot of times where a lot of gun owners feel like their backs up against a wall, but we have to, we have to talk to ourselves and say, no, we're not quitting and be vocal in the fight.
Speaker A:Call your congressman, send an email and support companies who are innovating to make sure that we have the firearms that we want to have, that we have options and that we can continue to grow the second amendment community.
Speaker A:I think a lot of people, when the start of COVID happened, thought, oh my goodness, they're wanting to shut down.
Speaker A:A lot of states wanted to shut down and say that there was no, what was their phrasing?
Speaker A:Essential workers in the second Amendment.
Speaker A:And that was the opposite of what is true.
Speaker A:And thankfully gun stores stayed open and we saw a massive increase in first time gun ownership.
Speaker A:And so, you know, those things are super important as we grow the second Amendment community, as we grow this coalition so that we can start restoring our rights so that those suppressors that you're making are easier to get a hold of and easier to buy.
Speaker A:And those, those things are net positive.
Speaker D:Well, you mentioned that like with the pandemic, you know, one of the biggest things I think that came out of the pandemic and the buying habits, right, you had a lot of people that were sitting on the fence about how they felt about they were gun agnostic you know what I mean?
Speaker D:In the right crowd, they're pro, and the right crowd, they're anti.
Speaker D:But then it tipped, right.
Speaker D:We saw record breaking for females, minorities, different age groups.
Speaker D:Right.
Speaker D:You'd never seen before.
Speaker D:Then you follow it up.
Speaker C:The 10 to 12 group was really booming.
Speaker C:It was very strong.
Speaker D:Don't clip that one up this.
Speaker D:But then like the scope reports come out and then you see, it's like, you know, three of the top five handguns are like subcompacts.
Speaker D:Well, what did we do?
Speaker D:Well, we've started making aftermarket subcompact barrels.
Speaker D: If, if you would have said in: Speaker D:But then you get the Shield barrel and the 43 and 43X and the 365 and the XL and.
Speaker D:And look at how much those are proliferated over the years.
Speaker D:And people got to them and then they got interested and they wanted to upgrade.
Speaker D:They wanted to customize.
Speaker D:In the case of our pistol compensators, they wanted to have something that made it a little less snappy.
Speaker D:You know, when they shoot.
Speaker C:Snappy.
Speaker C:Is that a technical term?
Speaker C:You want to have a snappy.
Speaker D:You don't want to mitig.
Speaker D:You want to mitigate your muzzle flip.
Speaker C:And felt less snappy.
Speaker B:Hey, that was snappy.
Speaker C:Your snappy meter calibrated.
Speaker D:Dude, I am.
Speaker B:I got to test those.
Speaker B:That was fun.
Speaker C:Sorry.
Speaker B:That was a fun week at the office.
Speaker B:I got to go out and test those.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker D:And I mean, and a bunch of engineering goes into it, so.
Speaker D:And some of the things too, you know, like for example, like Bob had Muzlock years ago.
Speaker D:Right.
Speaker D:And it has been like a fine, successful line.
Speaker D:You know what also really made it like jump up in the last few years?
Speaker D:Suppressor suppressors.
Speaker D:It's because it's easy to take on and off.
Speaker D:You can take it on and off.
Speaker A:In the field.
Speaker D:You could switch from suppressed on suppressed.
Speaker D:That was not really a key driving point.
Speaker D:Or the integral barrels you talked about.
Speaker C:And people used to leave muzzle device on for forever.
Speaker D:Forever.
Speaker D:And it's like, yeah, it got rid of your pin and weld needs.
Speaker D:But also the lightweight crowd really started to like it.
Speaker D:There are kind of these little phantom markets.
Speaker D:You're like, I did not think that that was going to play here, but it plays.
Speaker D:And then the same thing's true with the legislation side and the other thing.
Speaker D:It's not even just national.
Speaker D:I mean, obviously, like states like Illinois, states Like Washington states, obviously, like California.
Speaker D:California still gets, I mean, incredible amount sales.
Speaker D:Bad rap.
Speaker D:Oh, my gosh.
Speaker D:But, you know, we have tons of dealers in California and a lot of movement there.
Speaker D:I would say the one that was the worst in the last couple of years was Illinois.
Speaker D:I mean, that was.
Speaker D:That was rough.
Speaker D:You know, that was very rough.
Speaker D:And then, you know, we have to cut off direct to consumer customers in those states because the liability is way too high.
Speaker D:Because it's.
Speaker D:It's kind of purposefully vague in the statements.
Speaker D:Like anything that goes on an AR15.
Speaker D:I was like, well, we sell magazine marker bands.
Speaker D:You know, is that.
Speaker D:How many degrees?
Speaker C:Put your eyes out, you know?
Speaker D:You know, how far does that.
Speaker D:Far.
Speaker D:How far does that go?
Speaker C:Yeah, but, you know, I want to go back to something because, you know, I. I can see kind of a fork in the road.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:When you look at the Second Amendment or when you look at preserving gun rights, you can take a very specific approach and take direct actions in those issues, which people need to do.
Speaker C:So.
Speaker C:Thank you.
Speaker C:It needs to be done.
Speaker C:There's another approach, and if you look at our website or you look at our marketing, it's the fellowship of firearms.
Speaker C:Now we can go toe to toe and argue the issues, and we need to do that to challenge people who want to take rights away.
Speaker C:I agree with that 100%.
Speaker C:But at the same time, I think there's tremendous benefit for companies like ours to pursue the fellowship of firearms.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:What we make is as lethal as anyone else does, but what we look at and what we've always considered in our products.
Speaker C:Firearms have a personality and a memory and a fellowship aspect.
Speaker C:Where, you know, I went hunting with my grandfather.
Speaker C:This was my grandfather's gun.
Speaker C:I bought my son his first gun when he was, I won't say eight, but.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:They buy.
Speaker C:There's so many things that memories are tied to.
Speaker C:They went hunting, they went shooting.
Speaker C:I used to go to the farm with my uncle.
Speaker C:I used to go.
Speaker C:And what I.
Speaker C:What I think needs to be really championed and really re.
Speaker C:Emphasized is why do people have the affection for firearms initially?
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:Then it becomes political and they want to take it away.
Speaker C:So we have to go there and keep it.
Speaker C:And this becomes this.
Speaker C:This front.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:And it really.
Speaker C:The real substance behind is education and having more people experience using a firearm, a positive experience.
Speaker C:I tell you, I've taken everybody from, you know, youth to grandmothers that were 80 to 90 years old.
Speaker C:And the one thing you see when a lot of people shoot a firearm for the first Time is they turn on a smile, right?
Speaker C:They get a smile on their face.
Speaker C:And I've seen it way more than not.
Speaker C:And it's that.
Speaker C:That feeling that they get from doing it.
Speaker C:And it takes away the mystique and the negative aspects of it in most cases.
Speaker C:So when.
Speaker C:When I look at the people that we get to and be involved in our sport, in our activity, and look, there can be zombie day, there can all kinds of things with guns.
Speaker C:I get all that.
Speaker C:But the reality of it is most bullets are fired by firearms in fellowship with other people.
Speaker C:I took my son, I went with my brother, my dad took me.
Speaker C:When you think about that, I think that's an incredibly strong, strong emotion that's going to make people pro Second Amendment.
Speaker C:Not necessarily the front of the argument.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:Because that's important.
Speaker C:But the fundamental wave of people who say, I've done that, I enjoyed that.
Speaker C:I don't know why you're telling me this.
Speaker C:I've shot a gun.
Speaker C:All people that shoot guns aren't bad.
Speaker C:The more people we can get involved in our sport and our activity and to use the firearms in the constructive manner that they're meant to be, they'll get an emotional wave.
Speaker C:And I think when you look at it, you want people to have the drive to preserve it on their own, not just to be told that it's important.
Speaker C:So when you think of fellowship of firearms and you think of the massive number of people, all the new shooters, all the different groups who have been new gun owners.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And some of them are for security because of the way the times are getting.
Speaker C:I certainly respect that.
Speaker C:But a lot of them are.
Speaker C:They didn't understand.
Speaker C:I mean, we don't make shotguns, but shotguns are fun for shooting, sporting clays and skeet and trap.
Speaker C:We've done events with our church, at shooting ranges, Boy Scouts.
Speaker C:To me, to focus on the single facet of good and evil is really not covering the topic.
Speaker C:It is a way of a society, it is a component of a freedom.
Speaker C:It's an act that we get to do.
Speaker C:Do we want to take away water skiing because people might break their leg?
Speaker C:No, it's something people enjoy doing.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And I think we need to paint firearm ownership as obviously, it's a responsibility.
Speaker C:Certainly is.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:That's in writing.
Speaker C:But it also is something people can enjoy and without a lot of drama, just say, yeah, I'm a gun owner.
Speaker C:Yeah, I enjoy owning firearms.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:And, you know, it's so important that you make a positive experience for people with firearms, especially when you take them out for the first time, it is one of.
Speaker A:I know we've talked about it multiple times on the podcast.
Speaker A:It's one of the best ways to change someone's mind is to at least show them what they're arguing against.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And you'd be amazed at how you can take someone who may be hostile towards the second amendment and change them in an hour and a half's time.
Speaker C:And now they're an advocate.
Speaker C:You know what I love to take, if I'll take some people that I think are being nervous shooting, or maybe they're different types of people that I think aren't going to just jump right into a.308.
Speaker C:Right.22 suppressed.
Speaker B:Oh, yeah.
Speaker C:Just start with a.22 suppressed and safely teach them about the firearms and let them pull a trigger.
Speaker C:And then what I do is I'll take everything all the way up to a.308 or a 5.56 or something.
Speaker C:And suppressed helps tremendously on that first, that surreal environment.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker D:Fetal.
Speaker C:But then what's interesting is I like to take people like that and say, okay, now would you like to try something else?
Speaker C:Try a.380 or a 9 millimeter or something.
Speaker C:And most of the time it's amazing.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker C:And I've walked people from 22 suppressed to an ARAC762 and they're dumping mags within 30 minutes.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And they're doing it safely there.
Speaker C:We've got oversight for them, we're doing instruction for them.
Speaker C:They're in a safe environment to do it.
Speaker C:And by the time they, they went from that.22 spray, set that down, and they're shooting at 7.62, they're dumping mags, having a ball.
Speaker C:That's how I think we make this stick.
Speaker C:Know, bring people back to why these firearms are so fun and, and what you can do with them.
Speaker B:Yeah, Some of the most fun times I've had was when we went up to the Faxon farm, up to Barry's place and, and shot as a team.
Speaker B:And that was.
Speaker B:We, I mean, we goofed, we had fun, we tested stuff.
Speaker B:We worked, Bob.
Speaker B:I promise.
Speaker B:We worked.
Speaker B:I promise.
Speaker B:So for a moment.
Speaker B:But no, I had so much fun.
Speaker B:And, and that's, that's the big thing.
Speaker B:You know, you guys strive for this fellowship.
Speaker B:The, the ars, when they were first launched, it was the first line to kind of push off that first rifle for people.
Speaker B:You know, I couldn't have said it better, Bob.
Speaker B:You, you, you put, you hit the nail on the head there.
Speaker B:But we are getting the wrap up sign.
Speaker B:I, I we could go for another hour, but Kaylee, why don't you go.
Speaker D:Ahead stick around for the director's gut.
Speaker B:Oh God, not with you.
Speaker D:The extras.
Speaker D:French subtitles all right.
Speaker B:Great.
Speaker B:Here we go.
Speaker B:I can't tell.
Speaker B:We used to work together for a very long time.
Speaker A:Yes, I, I feel like the odd man out.
Speaker A:But that's all good.
Speaker A:It's all good.
Speaker A:So where can everyone find you?
Speaker A:Social media, all of this stuff.
Speaker A:Plug away.
Speaker D:Yeah, everything's at fax and firearms faxandfirearms.com you can find us on all the major platforms.
Speaker D:On X we are at faxandfirearms but generally a good Google search, you'll get what you'll need.
Speaker D:It'll be us, Fax and Machining and Brad Facts and the Golfer.
Speaker D:So there's really only a few options.
Speaker B:That's not you.
Speaker B:I thought that was your alter ego.
Speaker C:Certainly not the golfer.
Speaker C:But if you hit it near, I'll shoot at it.
Speaker B:Yeah, I believe that.
Speaker D:And you can find us at Goals.
Speaker D:Yes, Goals this year.
Speaker D:Yeah.
Speaker B:Well, before we go, I have a gift for both of you.
Speaker B:This is from AAC and Palmetto State Armory.
Speaker B:They've sponsored our gifts for our guests for this, so you'll be receiving this after the show.
Speaker B:Gift from Palmetto State Armory and AAC Ammo as a thank you for being on with us.
Speaker B:Really appreciate them doing that, like Dustin said, because he's the ultimate plug man.
Speaker D:Black man, so they say.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker D:I do hair transplants on the side too.
Speaker B:That's what I've heard the rumors.
Speaker B:True.
Speaker D:Now the plug man.
Speaker B:Check us out at goals.
Speaker B:August 9th and 10th in Knoxville, Tennessee.
Speaker B:Facts.
Speaker B:And we'll be there.
Speaker B:They've got their beautiful booth right up front.
Speaker B:They'll be one of the first people when you see when you walk in.
Speaker B:So go over there, get yourself a barrel and upper hug Bob.
Speaker B:I don't know if he likes that.
Speaker D:Or not, but see the new cans.
Speaker B:See the new cans.
Speaker B:But guys, thank you for watching.
Speaker B:Make sure to like, share and subscribe.
Speaker B:And again.
Speaker B:Knoxville, Tennessee, August 9th and 10th.
Speaker B:For goals, we will see you in Knoxville.
