I'm showing my age here, but when I started shooting in the late 1970's when you went into most shops where I live, you had generally your choice of a .38 special or .357 magnum revolver, a Colt .45 auto, the S&W 39 (I never recall actually seeing a 59 in stock for sale back then although they were available), the ubiquitous Ruger .22 auto and if the dealer was larger, maybe a Browning HP or a Walther P38.

When I go into dealers now, I am astounded at the huge selection of handguns available to shooters today.

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Originally posted by DaBigBR:
Nobody's buying anything. I'm not surprised that R&D funds are probably right, too.

Handguns are selling very well in many areas.

You should see all the guns some Sportsmans Warehouse stores are selling.

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You meant Super Redhawk, right?

Nope, GP100 #01780. Gallery of Guns/Davidson's exclusive.

I probably shoulda pointed out that I'm looking at/writing this from a retailer's/dealer's perspective.

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You complain about FN basically stepping on their own toes, then basically wrote a whole essay saying why every other company should do exactly that for novelty's sake.

No. I wrote an essay saying that manufacturers should expand their thinking and ideas instead of copying one another, including themselves and their own products. FNH gets picked on because they have two products with incompatible mags that effectively operate in the same damn market space. Choose one so I don't have to stock both just to have them compete against one another. Same problem with Ruger.

Instead of merely cloning they (and everyone else) should broaden their product lines in meaningful ways. Like Walther and their Q5. Like Walther and their CCP, version 2. Or SIG and the X-5, and of course their P365. Build that bull's-eye target version, heavy on the bull's-eye side and not pandering to the prepper/HDer in so many of us. Make use of different, definitely unconventional ideas. Yet so many of these companies instead are stuck on trying to make that proverbial "Glock killer", seemingly content with bellying up to the low hanging HD/PD/Tactical fruit bar and leaving it at that.

ANY gun can do self-defense, so why not create ones that expand their appeal in--for example--recreational shooting? Instead of having a bunch of guns that are just variations of the same damn mundane thing (the striker equivalent of 1911itis). Then a poor old gun shop--like the one I work in--isn't stuck with a shitload of sameness, almost all of it slow-selling, in part because so many consumers don't know much about them and DON'T WANT to know anything about them.

Side note to the 'boring' theme: nothing is more infuriating to a product buyer like me than the customer who only wants to buy a Glock because someone's friend kept telling him or her that it's the best. Never mind that there's a virtual UNIVERSE of alternatives to consider. They will fondle most of everything else, yet more often than not will steadfastly STICK to the one that their friend's friend's second cousin twice removed recommended. So tell me CZ and S&W and everyone else, whycha think that you really needed to sorta-clone the G19 again?

Having lots of choice is generally espoused as being a good thing. Until it's not. When so much of everything is just clones of one another. Please explain how all of this copycat behavior is actually good. The only thing that differentiates Brand A from Brand Z are the subtleties. That's it? Never mind that they all do the same thing in pretty much the same damn way? That Brand W's grip is oh so comfy? That makes or breaks the whole decision-making process?

As for gun manufacturers getting 'gun shy' given the current economic climate in the gun world and cutting back on their initiative to develop new designs; seems that NOW would be the time to come up with new stuff rather sitting back and hoping that your old design will actually stand out amongst the blandness of the rest. When sales are good, even smokin' good, that's NOT the time to introduce new product. The old stuff is selling like hotcakes; that's the time to take it all in and allow the fruits of their labors grow. Times like these when the selling is painful is when the inventive stuff is most needed to spur interest. Like the Hudson. Even the SilencerCo pistol. That kind of mind think is what I'd like to see happen more often, even if it doesn't always work like it's hoped for. Anything else is just stagnancy.

Just look at all of the rabid "ricing" and scratch building that's been going on. Gun owners wanting to make and build their own creations. Kind of indicative of what they REALLY think of the end products coming out of the gun makers, donchathink?

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Take up archery.

I'd be more than willing to if I thought that there were a sliver of a chance that it might improve our shop's gun sales. It won't, so I won't. So there.

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When I go into dealers now, I am astounded at the huge selection of handguns available to shooters today.

Yes it's a mass of confusion, ain't it? Just look at the glorious hell hole of having to stock all of that stuff, most of which is pretty much the same mundane, boring thing. Like 25 versions of Toyota Priuses. Wretched.

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I'm really not sure what you'd want.

For my own collecting, not much if not nothing at all. Which in that roundabout way is kinda the point. Well maybe the LTT. But for the shop, product diversity beyond mere differences in the brand name...without trying to sound too much like some gun-sellin' version of a Democrat.

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HK Just released their desert Jungle edition mk23

For real? Lipstick. Pig. Hell of a hog, though. But I gots dem small hands...

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Originally posted by CAR:
I'm showing my age here, but when I started shooting in the late 1970's when you went into most shops where I live, you had generally your choice of a .38 special or .357 magnum revolver, a Colt .45 auto, the S&W 39 (I never recall actually seeing a 59 in stock for sale back then although they were available), the ubiquitous Ruger .22 auto and if the dealer was larger, maybe a Browning HP or a Walther P38.

When I go into dealers now, I am astounded at the huge selection of handguns available to shooters today.

Yep. I think it was a pretty good year, looking at all the stuff listed on OP’s list of complaints.

Oh as for the volume of background checks. I don't doubt it. We've done a reasonable amount of them this year, only slightly down from the year before. But for us where the actual growth has been is in the inbound online sales transfers; our NICS checks for these transactions has probably tripled this year from all of 2017, with still a month and half to go. Aside from making a few bucks for doing the grunt work of the background check, we're certainly not moving any product as a result.

Welcome to the free market. Not every year's going to be a record-breaker and not every manufacturer is going to invest in new products in a down market. But it seemingly does give you an opportunity to divest yourself of some angst.

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HK Just released their desert Jungle edition mk23

For real? Lipstick. Pig. Hell of a hog, though. But I gots dem small hands...

Nah that is just an HK parts photo...