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Thread: What Makes a Gun Company’s Reputation. How Do they Rank

  1. #11
    Site Supporter Totem Polar's Avatar
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    Everyone’s experience colors how they perceive things. Glock’s handling of the early G42s puts them generally in the Sig category for me. I have some cool Glocks, but they were all purchased used, from friends. Great guns, but I’m not all that into supporting Gaston.

    Ruger just kills it on CS: some of the best in the biz. Henry, too.

    I’ve had good luck with Colt.

    Sig is dead to me.

    S&W is such a mixed bag. I guess I lump them in with Glock: the world is filled with *killer* used examples; i’m not into buying new.

    Can’t comment on Dan Wesson, Rock River, or Springfield, because all I’ve bought from any of them are full-size 1911s, and they all worked great.
    ”But in the end all of these ideas just manufacture new criminals when the problem isn't a lack of criminals.” -JRB

  2. #12
    Site Supporter CleverNickname's Avatar
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    I won't buy from some companies due to their marketing, independent of their products. For example, Troy hiring Lon Horiuchi as a trainer a few years back means I'll never buy anything from them again.

  3. #13
    Member olstyn's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by spyderco monkey View Post
    The Walther one is because they were purchased by Umarex, and so are sort of 2 companies producing under one brand.

    P99, PPQ, PPS, Olympic Pistols = Real Walther

    PK380, P22 = Built by the Umarex plant under the Walther brand
    Yeah, Umarex vs "real" Walther is generally the dividing line between the high quality guns and the low quality guns that I was alluding to. The PK380 is accurate and comfortable in the hand, but it's less than brilliantly reliable, and when holding it and operating its controls, it definitely feels "cheap" compared to a P99, PPS, or PPQ.

  4. #14
    Site Supporter rob_s's Avatar
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    I am pretty much all about “what have you done for me lately” these days. I have pretty much zero romanticism for any inanimate object or the company that makes them. And I’m finding people of the counterpoint to be in increasingly odd.

    That said, I do get disappointed when someone falls off the cliff in terms of quality. For example, if Glock suddenly started letting me down with their products in some way I’d be a little sad, I suppose, but I’d mostly be annoyed at having to find something new, and at having to buy all new holsters, mags, tools, etc.

    I want “innovation” to a degree (it’s actually my job at work) but I find that too often it’s just another bright shiny object. Too often, the guy squeaking about “innovation” is busy shooting C-class at two matches a year and never getting any training. Incremental improvement is meaningless, although I will say that while many people complain about Glock’s lack of “innovation”, I think they do incremental improvement quite well.
    Does the above offend? If you have paid to be here, you can click here to put it in context.

  5. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by Doc_Glock View Post
    I was thinking today about how or why a company gains a reputation and wanted to post more as a discussion starter than anything else.
    This is what I do for a living.

    Quote Originally Posted by spyderco monkey View Post
    Innovation, Quality, Performance, and Reliability, are what I look at.

    Sadly, very few companies score well across all of those.
    This nails it for all brands, not just gun makers.

    A brand’s reputation comes from how well it understands what customers and markets value. For instance, Innovation is key for pharma or we’d never see new medicines. It’s also key for software but radically overstated by most brands that lay claim to it. For shooters, Innovation matters to the degree that it improves the other variables.

    For PF posters, Reliability is not negotiable. Quality and Performance come next, but how do we define them?

    I think that
    • Quality = Durability and Accuracy. Fit and Finish are much lower on the list or we’d all be on a 1911 forum.
    • Performance = how well the shooter can run a given design, which I’d call Usability.

    So what we’re really looking for are Reliable, Durable, Accurate, Usable products.

    Very few individuals can quantify qualitative things reliably, so we rely on the experience of others, from random internet neckbeards to the published results of rigorous testing against established industry standards. PF's best work is when it reverses the criteria for those variables from anecdotes backed up by cherry-picked data to actual data tempered by insight from knowledgeable, experienced users.

    If a company has a reputation for producing gear that routinely gets adopted and retained by reputable LE and military organizations, then I’m interested.


    Okie John
    “The reliability of the 30-06 on most of the world’s non-dangerous game is so well established as to be beyond intelligent dispute.” Finn Aagaard
    "Don't fuck with it" seems to prevent the vast majority of reported issues." BehindBlueI's

  6. #16
    Quote Originally Posted by CleverNickname View Post
    I won't buy from some companies due to their marketing, independent of their products. For example, Troy hiring Lon Horiuchi as a trainer a few years back means I'll never buy anything from them again.
    While I get your point, have you contacted them directly? The manufacturing and training divisions are totally separate. Lost sales in products would see Troy attempting to make up profits on the training side and effectively double down on Ruby Lon. Meanwhile, some poor schmuck on the lathe gets down-sized.

    Edit to be on-topic: I'll stick my neck out and say my top two companies are Kel-Tec and Hi-Point. The former for greenlighting a ton of truly new designs in an industry terrified of the slightest gamble. Even if my only example of their designs predates the company with my Grendel P-10.

    Hi-Point for having a very clear and specific ethos to which they stick. Functional guns for the proles using local materials and processes. I've run a number of their carbines at matches, in classes, drilling at the range, with a wide variety of ammo, and the pigs just work. Less enthused about their handguns but even those have run in my experience, typically better in .40 and 45 ACP. It's a refreshingly focused and neighborly company.

    Neither is a top quality maker but I really feel like neither gets enough respect so they're the two for which I'll shill.
    Last edited by SCCY Marshal; 01-27-2021 at 09:57 AM.

  7. #17
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    I got burned on a first release G42 - it was a horror. Had to go back and I still don't trust it. My pocket gun of choice returned to one of my J frames. Now, my other Glocks have been fine except for a spring replacement many thousand rounds out - but that's ok.

    A Taurus Pt-22 was another horror. Sold it. A SW 1911Sc commander took some serious breaking in.

    So, to me, it's an empirical question, I don't trust any company as a global statement. Keltec - my friends' little ones were trouble and I saw an Su-16 break in half in carbine class.

    I've been tempted to by a Hi-Point handgun for sheer pistol idiocy grins.

  8. #18
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    Quote Originally Posted by olstyn View Post
    Walther is a weird one. I honestly believe that the PPQ, P99, and PPS series are excellent guns, and the few times I've had to call their customer service number either for service or just to buy some stuff, the people on the other end have been super helpful, even occasionally comping me small parts. (I openly admitted to launching a safety plunger off into nowhere in my garage, expecting to buy a new part, and they just mailed me one for free.) However, they also make some fairly weak-sauce guns like the PK380 and the P22, so...*shrug* I see them as much more good than bad, but it also pays to be well informed about which of their guns are good/desirable and which are less so.
    While the P22 and Pk380 are sold as Walthers aren’t they actually made by Umarex ? Though I believe they are sister companies under the same ownership.

  9. #19
    Member olstyn's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by SCCY Marshal View Post
    Hi-Point for having a very clear and specific ethos to which they stick. Functional guns for the proles using local materials and processes. I've run a number of their carbines at matches, in classes, drilling at the range, with a wide variety of ammo, and the pigs just work. Less enthused about their handguns but even those have run in my experience, typically better in .40 and 45 ACP. It's a refreshingly focused and neighborly company
    Quote Originally Posted by Glenn E. Meyer View Post
    I've been tempted to by a Hi-Point handgun for sheer pistol idiocy grins.
    Sample of one, of course, but my father in law's Hi-Point 9mm handgun couldn't consistently get through a magazine without a jam the one time I saw it in use at the range.

  10. #20
    Member olstyn's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by HCM View Post
    While the P22 and Pk380 are sold as Walthers aren’t they actually made by Umarex ? Though I believe they are sister companies under the same ownership.
    Yeah, that's my understanding, and the basic trouble with the brand - Umarex markets some lower-quality items under the Walther name, which somewhat taints that name.

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