April 19, 2026 • 43 mins
Live from the Ruger booth at the 2026 NRA Annual Meetings.
-- Ruger stretches the lines of the RXM pistol and the American Gen II rifle, including left handed models!
-- Mark Keefe, long-time editor at the NRA, talks about his favorite guns, including historic one.
-- What's behind the constant offering of discount guns from Palmetto State Armory?
Gun Talk 04.19.2026 Hour 2
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/gun-talk--6185159/support.
-- Ruger stretches the lines of the RXM pistol and the American Gen II rifle, including left handed models!
-- Mark Keefe, long-time editor at the NRA, talks about his favorite guns, including historic one.
-- What's behind the constant offering of discount guns from Palmetto State Armory?
Gun Talk 04.19.2026 Hour 2
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/gun-talk--6185159/support.
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
From the range to the field. CZ firearms are built
to perform when it counts. Known for accuracy, durability, and reliability,
CZ stands apart, CZ built for those who demand more
CZ firearms dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Yeah, I'm still talking about guns and we're still having fun.
I'm Tom Gresch. It's gun talk. That's what we did.
People say, how can you talk for guns for three hours?
Speaker 3 (00:25):
No?
Speaker 2 (00:25):
No, no, I talk for about guns for twelve hours a day,
pretty much the whole time. We're at the Ruger booth
at the NRA's annual meetings in Houston, talking right now
with Taber Bright Tabor. I was listening to the lead
in on this and it sets something about why should
you own an AR fifteen. I had a flashback. I
was thinking about you know, we've been talking about AR
fifteen's for a long long time and they were kind
(00:48):
of niche in the marketplace thirty years ago. And there
was one point where something changed. And for me, it
was when Ruger brought out an AR fifteen. I said,
when Ruger has an AR fifteen, it has gone completely mainstream, right.
Speaker 4 (01:06):
Yeah, it really has. I mean I can't remember the
years ago. I mean because again I started behind a
gun counter at sixteen and looking at you know, Soldier,
Fortune magazine and those things, and Ronnie Barrett with his
guns on the cover, and you know, Eugene articles about
Eugene Stoner and ArmaLite and AR fifteen, yes, and all
of those guns. And I was I mean, from the
(01:27):
time I was that young, I was hooked on AR
fifteen's So I've always had this great love of them.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, but it was smaller company, absolutely, where there was Colt,
but for the most part of the smaller companies, it
was not Ruger.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
It was not main you know, they really didn't become
mainstream until the Internet and social media and those things
really grew and people saw all the different things you
can do with them and compete and hunt and protect.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Well, people started to understand them.
Speaker 5 (01:55):
Yeah, absolutely, all right.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
So Ruger comes out with the AR fifteen and they've
had several versions and all of that, and now you've
got a completely new thing. Something new has happened. You
bought Anderson Manufacturing, which has a fabulous manufacturing facility, and
you've moved all your production of your AR platform to
that new factory.
Speaker 4 (02:17):
All MSRs, you know, from our small frame to our
five five to six three hundred blackout all small frame
or all I'm sorry. All MSR rifles are now built
in hebron Kentucky. We have you know, one of the
great things that came out of that acquisition is the
eighty seven employees that we kept because they are really
just passionate. They just wanted deliver a good gun. And
(02:39):
what the first two models we've come out with, you know,
have one that's a little bit more basic with some
basic M four furniture and a sort of lightweight style
handguard that doesn't have a full twelve o'clock rail. And
then we have a next level up there's still similar
price points, nothing crazy. One has magpole furniture with a
full twelve o'clock rail. Both of those guns can be
(03:00):
bought for under six hundred dollars on the street. What
yeah called the Harrier Harrier Rifles.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
Why a new name?
Speaker 5 (03:09):
Well, you know, you you moved to a new facility.
Speaker 4 (03:15):
You want to you know, shine the penny a little bit,
so to speak. New names, new people, new manufacturing location.
Speaker 6 (03:23):
New model the people to look at it.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
Yes, and what we've done is is this is what
was important to me is unfortunately towards the end of
the previous manufacturer, some of the guns were not the
greatest things on the world, and there was sort of
this stigmatism with that facility. So it was important to
me to eliminate that ins stigmatism immediately. But I wanted
to do it. We wanted to do it at a
(03:46):
price point. And that's what was really important is I
was really really stringent on them about making sure they
did exactly what we said they were going to do.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
So how did that wark were the employees. They're okay
with you bring it in and say, hey, we're gonna
make really good guns.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
Oh well, so I you know, when we first start
turning the machines back on and started making chips, before
every shift started, I addressed the entire shift and I said, look,
this is important that the crosshairs are on us. We
need to deliver a solid quality product at a price point.
So if you're not comfortable putting it in a box,
(04:23):
don't don't sign your name on that inspection sticker or
that end invoice or whatever.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
If you, as the boss are okay, if they say look,
this shouldn't be shipped out.
Speaker 5 (04:31):
They're losing their job. If they don't say that for me. Huh.
Speaker 2 (04:36):
There's a lot of places they're thinking, well, I got
to get this thing shipped, no matter what.
Speaker 4 (04:39):
No, no, no, no, no, that's that's you know. The
Harrier rifle is exactly what we meant it to be.
A five hundred dollars street price, you know, no joke, straightforward,
blue collar working man's gun to work.
Speaker 5 (04:52):
It's just gonna work.
Speaker 4 (04:53):
It shoots modestly in that one to one point five
ma with goods quality AMO, it's got all the adaptability
of any other AR fifteen on the market, and it's
one hundred percent American made.
Speaker 5 (05:06):
That was also important to me.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
Now, other companies do find things with price point guns
with products made from other parts of the world.
Speaker 5 (05:14):
Were ruger.
Speaker 4 (05:15):
That's not happening. This gun is one hundred percent American made.
And we filtered all of those things out of the
building before we made the first gun.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Wow. Okay, so you got two models.
Speaker 4 (05:26):
Two models right now, and the engineering team got a
little little They were.
Speaker 5 (05:33):
Were screaming for stuff to do.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
So my partners in crime, Matt Wilson Andrew Gore, Mark Bailey,
we laid out the next eighteen months of models to
come so you're you know, if you're you're sitting at home,
you're gone, where did SFA are go? Or where did
three hundred blackout go? How about you know some of
the new calibers. Just be patient. What I can tell
(05:56):
you is is we are all solid gun people.
Speaker 6 (05:59):
That you want to out just as much as everybody else.
Speaker 4 (06:03):
You have no idea because I'm not a patient person time,
not even a little bit. So you'll see small Frame
come back, and you'll see a bevy of new features. Uh,
you'll see some new calibers, and we have you know,
right now we.
Speaker 5 (06:19):
Have the two working man guns out.
Speaker 4 (06:21):
We've already planned three levels above that, from price point
to features to you know, all of the cool guy stuff,
the better.
Speaker 5 (06:29):
Triggers and the.
Speaker 4 (06:30):
Folding stocks and all of the things you can think of.
We're talking about every bit of that.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
Because you know what people want and you don't. You're
not waiting till next shots should release things, and they're
gonna be coming out throughout.
Speaker 4 (06:41):
As quickly as I can get them made. You know,
one of the things that happens when you take a
facility that's been shut down for a period of time
is it's not just turn the switch and turn things
back on because things lose, inspection processes, programs go away,
measuring devices have to be re and then you also
bring in a different mindset and a different group of
(07:03):
engineers that have their own things in the Ruger way,
and we needed to teach that to the great staff
that's there. You know, we've got Laddie to Pass, who's
just an amazing manufacturing engineer that is also a huge
AR fifteen fan, and again he's leading the engineering team
over there.
Speaker 5 (07:22):
They just want to deliver great guns.
Speaker 4 (07:24):
We've got Brandon in the in the quality side of things,
and he's been so particular and so stringent about the
rules that we've all put in place of what it
can and can't look like before it leaves the building.
And we've had to make a couple of trips in
there to make sure he's not being over zealous with
those things.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
It's okay, you can that we do have to write
a few guns now, right.
Speaker 4 (07:49):
Right, And we had to relax some of that because
not that he was doing anything wrong, but he was
being particular, which is what I personally.
Speaker 7 (07:58):
He was trying to make sure it was the way
you want and he was following those orders, and he's
gotten so good at it that now we can trust
him to back We back off a little bit, let
him make the calls.
Speaker 5 (08:10):
And again, it.
Speaker 4 (08:11):
Is a pretty basic five hundred dollars gun that's going
out there, but it looks good and it does everything
it's meant to do.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
I am reading between the lines and just hearing your voice,
and I can imagine that these folk at this factory
are really happy now.
Speaker 5 (08:27):
They seem to be in terms of.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Saying, we can really turn out a quality product we're
proud of.
Speaker 4 (08:32):
Yeah, and you know this is a backup just a second.
Speaker 5 (08:37):
I grew up behind a gun counter.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
I grew up on AR fifteen's eight seventy pump shotguns
in nineteen eleven. So Ar fifteen's are my thing. And
when you know, my boss has said, hey, Tabor, we're
going to give you this run with it and deliver
a solid product.
Speaker 5 (08:54):
And then it's not me. It's not all me.
Speaker 4 (08:56):
I tend to say that in conversation just because of
the way we're talking, but really I'm surrounded by this
amazing team of people in Hebrew and may it in
and we've come together and delivered a solid product.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
They're not the only people having fun right now.
Speaker 5 (09:09):
No, they're not.
Speaker 4 (09:11):
I You know, I have to pinch myself every time
I'm on the plant floor because I talk about all
these high spots of my life. You know that when
I was at Smith and Wesson and you walk down
the ramp into the into the production floor and you're
standing on that giant logo on the ramp, right, you know,
that's one being in Ronnie Barrett's office after growing up
watching him on the cover of magazines and things, some
(09:35):
of the Wounded Warrior hunts, things like that. And then
I pull off the partnership with Dead Air and deliver
the great products that happen to win a Golden Bullseye
Award this year and now Harrier and how it's been
received and looking at the backworder, you know, because again
the AR market's kind of soft right now because people
were delivering either really expensive product or really cheap, not
(09:58):
so great product right and they needed a happy.
Speaker 5 (10:01):
Medium, and we've delivered that. The team has delivered.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
That exciting stuff. Can't wait to see what's coming next.
Same you want to get it out the door.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
I've seen it on paper, I've seen some drawings now
I want to touch feel shoot.
Speaker 6 (10:16):
Right. Thank you so much.
Speaker 5 (10:17):
Thank you for having me here, man, Thank you for
having us.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
This is terrific. Thank you for having me in the booth.
All right, we're at the Ruder booth and we're at
the ISSANDUEL meetings here in Houston, Texas.
Speaker 6 (10:26):
And we'll come back.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
We're going to talk about good guns and cool guns,
and yeah we're gonna talk about some old guns. Be
right back.
Speaker 8 (10:44):
One rifle every reason. The Ruger American Gen two is
your go anywhere, do everything. Bold gun available in multiple calibers,
with a smooth, Bold, crisp trigger and modern aconomics. This
is the rifle you grab, whether it's your camp, the
bag forty or a quick trip to the range. Accurate,
affordable American The Ruger American Jen two Your hunt starts
(11:09):
a year.
Speaker 9 (11:16):
Want the latest and guns, gear and shooting infos straight
into your inbox. Sign up for the gun Talk newsletter.
Get insider access to reviews, exclusive deals, training tips, and
the hottest stories from the range, delivered every week. Don't
miss out on the news and offers every shooter needs
to know. It's fast, free and easy. Sign up today
(11:36):
at gun talk dot com. That's gun Talk dot com.
Speaker 10 (11:44):
Celebrate America's two hundred and fiftieth anniversary by competing in
the NRA America's Rifle Challenge ARC Across America National competition.
Build your skills, challenge friends and family and see where
you rank across the country. Enter more than once to
improve your score and earn bragging rights on the leaderboard.
Every match is a chance to win prizes and sharpen
your marksmanship. Learn more at ARC dot NRA dot org.
(12:09):
Celebrate and exercise your rights through competition.
Speaker 11 (12:15):
Owning, shooting, and carrying firearms is your responsibility. Range Ready
Studios offers gun training classes taught by top level instructors
with real world experience. Range Ready delivers basic and advanced
classes for pistol and rifle. We also offer a lady's
only handgun course. All these training classes at range Ready
(12:35):
prepare you to use your gun and win the fight.
Find us at Rangereadystudios dot com.
Speaker 6 (12:41):
To learn more.
Speaker 8 (12:44):
Precision isn't a suggestion, it's the standard. The Ruger Precision
Rifle is built for the long game, match grade accuracy,
fully adjustable chassis, and build to last a lifetime. This
isn't just another long range gun, a system engineered to
go along, shoot tight and own the podium, whether it's paper,
(13:06):
steel or out past one thousand. You've got the tool,
the Ruger Precision rifle miles ahead.
Speaker 3 (13:16):
All right here.
Speaker 2 (13:27):
Yeah, we're kind of broadcasting over barb bar right now,
hoping that signal gets through. We're in the Ruger booth
at the NRA's annual meetings. When you do these things remote,
you never know what you're going to get. So if
I go away for a minute, count yourself lucky you
don't have to listen to me for a little while.
That's okay, we're trying now by a long long time friend,
Marquis from the NRA. How are you doing, partner?
Speaker 6 (13:48):
I am doing great, Tom, It's great to be here
with you.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
Okay, you currently have like this incredibly long title because
you keep they keep throwing things at you. So what
are you these days?
Speaker 6 (13:56):
Yeah? So I'm the director of editorial and Public Affairs,
and you know, I'm running the editorial staff doing American
Rifleman television still the producer host, and then I've got
a good team on the public affair side, trying to
get Enery's message out there.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
When did you start with NRA Well.
Speaker 6 (14:14):
I started as a volunteer at the museum in nineteen
eighty eight, No, nineteen eighty nine, sorry, And then for
I think seven to fifty one an hour, they had
me scraping boogers off the glass at the Nurrey Museum.
The job was a lot more janitorial, they said, curatorial assistant.
It was more janitorial. Tom ended up.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Being the editor of American Riflemen and then going on
from there. So you've been doing this quite a while.
What got you started in firearms in the first place.
Speaker 6 (14:42):
Well, I grew up shooting and hunting a little bit,
but then I went to boy Scout camp and I
learned about small boer rifle and so this is back
when rifle shooting merit badge was three position shooting, and
so I really really loved doing it. Got into Civil
War reenacting, and then my dream was to run the
(15:04):
boy Scout rifle range at Campowman and the shotgun range,
you know, But I, you know, I'd shot a lot
of guns by then. But they handed a twenty year old,
twenty one year old the keys to his own rifle
and shotgun range. Tom. But that's that's how I became
an UNERA certified instructor.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
So there you go.
Speaker 6 (15:21):
Yeah, and I had to help my friend Phil Schreyer
on weekends at the museum with tours and four age groups.
It was wonderful. You also have.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
A love of history that goes along with this.
Speaker 6 (15:32):
I do. Yeah, we you know. I was a history
major University of Maryland, grew up in Maryland, going to
Civil War battlefields Smithsonian, DC, and I've always had a
passion for it. And one of the things that this
job has allowed me to do is to tie guns
in history together.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
Yes, and I talk about that a good bit. I said,
look for people may not understand it. For a lot
of people in the gun world, they are actually not
just amateur but actually quite accomplished historians through the firearms.
Speaker 6 (16:06):
Absolutely. Yeah. There's a guy, Joel Bowie. He lives up
in New England and he's a gung guy American Society
of Arms Collectors, but he actually did battlefield archaeology for
Lexington and Concord and the battlefield Row Road back to
Boston where Redcoats got shot by angry Yankees angry Americans
(16:27):
and most of the guns were long barreled, smooth bore fowlers,
but they were different bullet sizes, so he can tell
one guy was at Lexington Green and also for Putnam's
Revenge the same they ambushed the column. That guy was
in both places because they have his bullets. Oh yeah, yeah,
(16:50):
So you want to talk about real American.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
History, Well, you know, and I was thinking about that,
and yes, you can track all the battles and all
the history, but then there's a different level of that,
and you find it in surprising places and in surprising people.
The one that I always think about is I was
doing a photo shoot in Montana with Dad, was doing
(17:14):
a story with Hank Williams Jr. And he would reach
into his vault and pull out one of his mini sharps,
original sharps, and he'd say, well, this one was made
in such and such, and it was shipped to this
hardware store and such and such where it was sold
to so and so who took it out in a wagon.
(17:34):
He knew everything that happened with that. It was astounding.
Speaker 6 (17:39):
Yeah. So gun collecting is just such such a rich
field where you can you can pretty much focus on
anything you want, but you know, you can you can
drill down, so you know, you can have every variation
of the inland m one car being from old Fortune.
So so ner A is so wonderful. You know, Eddy
Eagles safety and Education on commerce for the legislative fight.
(18:02):
But we also have our gun collecting department, and there
are eleven affiliated gun collecting clubs here that put together
exhibits just for here. Now, these these aren't museum guns.
These are guns that belong to.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
Guys like privately own guns.
Speaker 6 (18:15):
Yeah, they belonged to guys that live in Ohio, Ohio
Gun Collectors Association or Colt Collectors. So great display everything
you ever wanted to know about the illinam one car being.
And across the aisle there's a cult side hammer percussion
revolver that was owned by William C. Church. Colonel Church
the editor of the Army and Navy Gazette who founded
(18:37):
the National Rifle Association with this Powell General Wingate in
the offices of the Army and Navy Journal in New York.
Oh yeah, I.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Mean, and this is history that you could pick up
absolutely and if you wanted to, you could shoot.
Speaker 6 (18:51):
Well. You know, it's funny you say that. Ed Friedman
took over as the editor in chief of American riflemen.
And he worked with our old friend Rick Hacker, you
remember Ricka, and he did shooting safe queens. So in
a moment of insanity, they took the Brett out nineteen
thirty four gold plated in grave presented to Chuck Yeager
(19:13):
by the Cuban air Minister. That's in our museum, and
they shot at Tom.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
No.
Speaker 6 (19:20):
The problem was I had meetings all day that day
and it went back in the case, and I might
not kidnassed out on it. I did so. No, Yeah,
but I knew Chuck Colonel Yeger. I mean, he used
to come to the annual meetings all the time. Nicest
man in the world. And it is true what they say.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
What he said his book about his eyesight. Our good
friend Ray Elgin, who hunted with him, he said, yeah,
it's in a blind with him one time and he
said there's still pitch dark in the morning and says,
Chuck is good, resais. Chuck says, yeah, that's deer out there.
And he said, Ray looked out there and says it's
Pitt's black. He says, come on, Chuck, he says, no,
it's an a point out there. Come on, it's pitch dark.
(20:02):
You can't see that. So it's like fifteen minutes later
he looks at there goes, here's Nate point Buck out there.
Speaker 6 (20:08):
Yeah, the dude really could see like that, And it's funny.
That reminds me of story Jim Norell, who worked with
us for years. He was having tea with Bill Jordan
and his mom and they're sitting there in the kitchen.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
Jordan, the famous Border Patrol one fastraw guy, wrote the
book No second place winner, Unbelievable Character Okay.
Speaker 6 (20:29):
And an entery field rep. He appeared on the cover
of American Rifleman in his blue jeans with a turkey
over her shoulder, so somehow he managed. Anyway, They're just
sitting there and there's a fly buzzing around, and his
mother reached up out of there, and she's like ninety
years old and just catches the fly in her fingertips,
snatches it out of the air, snatches it right out
(20:50):
of the air, and then turned and you know, Jim
asked about it, and she's like, what not. Everybody can
do that, right right?
Speaker 2 (20:58):
Bill told me similar stories about his mom, which goes
to the whole you could shoot as much as Bill
Jordan or Jerry Mitchlick. You'll still never be as good
as they are.
Speaker 6 (21:09):
They have a gene we don't, Tom, they do.
Speaker 2 (21:12):
You know, it's a whether it's you know, fast twitch
gene or whatever. It's like, yeah, you know, Uh, Doug Kanang, Yeah,
I had people say, we know, if I had the sponsorships,
I had that much money, you know, I could be
that good.
Speaker 6 (21:23):
No, you couldn't, No, Doug, Doug, Doug Kanig one of
the world's nicest men.
Speaker 4 (21:27):
Uh.
Speaker 6 (21:28):
But when when it's shooting time, he's he's in a
different place than you and me.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
Well, a factors ray out and Toby's yeah, he's at
Whittington Center. It's a Doug is shooting offhand with a
rifle and the hating targets at a thousand yards off hand,
and nobody can do that. Well, yeah, Doug can. Yeah,
that's why we know his name.
Speaker 6 (21:47):
All right.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
We're talking with Mark if Uh, editor of American Rifleman.
He's hitting charge of publications, he's in charge of all
sorts of stuff public affairs at NRA, and he's a
gun collector and a good friend. So don't go any
we're talking. When we come back in just a minute. Actually,
we had a great hunt in Alaska one time, and
then we had a most interesting quail hunt that we
(22:08):
probably can't tell all the details about.
Speaker 6 (22:10):
I signed it in Da Tom.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Let's just say that it was an interesting walk to
try to find the cottages after we left the bar. Yeah.
Sometimes we'll tell that story back with here with visit
with Mark Keith. During the break, you started to were
reminding me of a meeting we had that we're planning
(22:35):
out your TV show or something.
Speaker 6 (22:36):
What was that? So you and I were at the
NSGIP NSGW show, the Wholesaler Show, and you had just
found out that you were getting a television show on
the Outdoor Channel, and I had also found out that
I was getting a show on the Outdoor Channel, and
we just sat there in the Texas sun and talked
about how not to step on each other's toes too much.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
Yeah, it's it worked out pretty well.
Speaker 6 (22:58):
It has.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
It's like, you know, I love it. People say, were
you guys and competitors? No, we're friends. Yeah, it's a
whole different deal, right. All right, So you did a
story some years ago, and we got to do this
because it kind of coincides with our two hundred and
fiftieth anniversary of the country.
Speaker 6 (23:12):
Yeah, so here in Houston, you know, it's NA celebrates
USA two fifty And you know, the entire American Revolution
started in April nineteen, seventeen seventy five because Major Pitt
Cairn and his red coated thugs decided they wanted to
take guns away from Americans. And we know how that
worked out.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
Yeah, it didn't work out so well for them.
Speaker 6 (23:32):
Okay, so, but but guns have been in the United
States since there were Europeans. And so I did the
story called Ten Guns that Shaped America, and I leaded
it all. Led off the story with what we thought
was the John Alden wheel lock. And you know, they
thought it came over on the Mayflower, and you know,
(23:52):
everybody thought that was true. And so we started lately
looking at the gun and by the gun, not the
story Tom that wheel lock was made in aut sixteen eighty.
Oh yeah, yeah, Pilgrims were dead by then. Now away
it came over on the may Fly.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Yeah, it's another gun show, lie.
Speaker 6 (24:08):
Yeah, yeah, but then you start looking at guns and
I misspoke. It wasn't Putnam, he was a different guy.
Captain Parker commanded the Lexington Militia Company, and his musket
is at the Massachusetts State Capitol. For many years it
hung in the main chamber with a trigger lock on it,
you know, because a musket with nothing in it and
(24:29):
no flint.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
Could go off at any time.
Speaker 6 (24:32):
Dangerous, tom absolutely dangerous. But then you know, I went
through and I talked about the American long rifle, and
I think one of the most important guns in American
history is the gun used by Timothy Murphy. He was
under the command of Dan Morgan, my favorite foul Mouth
founding father. He's the guy who won the Battle of
Coupans for us. But Timothy Murphy took three shots at
(24:55):
Briader General Simon Fraser during the Battle of Saratoga in
seventy seven seventy seven, and took him three shots, but
he hit him mortally wounded. The legend goes that Morgan
said he's a brave man, but he has to die.
More likely profanity was involved with and Morgan. But Simon
(25:15):
Fraser's hit, the British counter attack fails, we win the
Battle of Saratoga for going surrenders. The French come into
the war and as a whole new ball game.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Okay, so it was Attorney Point and actually the founding
of our country.
Speaker 6 (25:28):
Absolutely absolutely so. And then you kind of go through,
you know, other seminal guns in this story, and again
it's ten guns of shaped America, and you go into
the Winchester seventy three, obviously the gun that won the West,
when really the gun that won the West was probably
a trapdoor carbing in the hands of an illiterate Irish
immigrant on the American West. But then you know, you
(25:51):
start getting into the twentieth century and there's some great
guns people need to know about there even before the
twentieth century. There's the Gatling guns commanded by John Parker,
right machine gun Parker who supported Roosevelt's attack at San
Juan Hill and brought America into the americith century. And
we have one of those guns at our museum. Wow.
And I've shot one other of them too, but I
(26:12):
can't say where it is. But then you know, you
get into everybody says that Alvin York had a nineteen
seventeen Enfield because his regiment had one. Well, I talked
to his sons, George Washington and Andrew Jackson York at
an enter ratio and they swear that daddy. Can you
imagine I've got ninety year old men calling their dad daddy? Right,
(26:34):
shot an O three Springfield because Daddy didn't cott into
Pete sites.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
Sergeant York yep A No three Springfield.
Speaker 6 (26:41):
Wow? So uh And the monument on the state Capitol
grounds very clearly you know three in the family was involved.
So okay, So either pabue, either the book guys are wrong,
or the family's wrong.
Speaker 5 (26:53):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
Go with the family every time. All right, All right,
picked one or two more recent guns that we got
to talk about.
Speaker 6 (26:59):
Yeah, so I would say the M one Grand used
by a guy named Day Turner during the Battle of
the Bulge. She was a draftee, a sergeant, and he
basically wiped out a German infantry platoon by himself. When
his grand ran dry. He bayoneted a guy and the
bannit was stuck, so he grabbed a lantern and threw
(27:20):
it down the stairs and burned a bunch of Germans,
and once they went outside on fire, rolling in the snow,
he bayonetted them to death. He was a bad dude,
he was, and sadly he still remains in Belgium because
he was killed later on trying to save a fellow soldier.
But that's an American rifle in the spirit of the
American Warrior. One of the other guns, we call it
(27:41):
the banana I think it's watermelon and coconut rifle, a
very early cold AAR fifteen select a fire and they
would take this rifle and they would demonstrate it to
foreign governments and people like that, and they blow up
coconuts with it. Because of the twist rate, the five
five six two two three was very unstable to blow
him up. Everyone's like, oh, we got to have that,
(28:02):
and uh so that's bizarre and uh oh gosh. The
famous Air Force uh uh general he was chief of
staff at the Air Force. He was at a picnic
on a Virginia farm and the and the watermelon coconut
rifle was there and they shot a watermelon and of
course it exploded as the bullet was tumbling, and uh
(28:23):
they said generally, you wanna you wanta, you wanna eat
the other one, and then he said, no, let's eat
the son of a beep yep. But that that was
that's that's that gun in that watermelon put the United
States on the path of adoption of the gun that
we know as the M sixteen and the M four.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
Amazing, amazing stuff. All right, I'm gonna kick you out
the door. Okay, Tom, We're gonna keep doing this because
you're not not only can do this for hours, We
have done this for hours.
Speaker 6 (28:48):
Yeah, and uh sometimes it's worth listening to rarely.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
But there you go, Mark Keith, I think there's a pleasure,
my friend. You take care all right, We're gonna do
a hot swap here of the microphone. We've got to
hand this thing over here. There we go. Justin put
that on if you would. This this is what you
take care of. Mark.
Speaker 6 (29:07):
This is what you call live radio.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
Justin. We've got Justin Isabas Shars, Yes, sir, Okay, Justin
Bashers from Palmetta State Armory. This is how the sausage
gets made. You guys are just behind the scenes watching
it because we are live all over the country right
now doing this thing.
Speaker 6 (29:22):
Let's start off with this.
Speaker 2 (29:25):
Most people get your mailings that I know, get your
mailings every day. But for those who don't, what is
Palmetta State.
Speaker 12 (29:31):
Armory, Well, Palulmetto State Armory.
Speaker 13 (29:33):
We are a fairly new gun company and industry, and
the main thing we're focused on is spreading freedom to
as much Americans as possible. So the way we accomplish
that mission is we make quality, American made firearms and
we offer them at a very affordable price.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
And a lot of people would think of you and
know you as we would call a mail order house
online place where you can buy guns. But you said
it correctly, and people need to understand that you're a
gun maker. You're not just somebody who sells other people's guns.
Speaker 12 (30:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 13 (30:06):
We make a wide variety of products. I mean primarily
AR fifteen's, but we're expanding that every day. We make handguns,
we make ak platform rifle.
Speaker 6 (30:15):
We make a lot of guns, Yeah, a lot.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
The reality is you're actually one of the bigger gun makers.
Speaker 5 (30:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 12 (30:21):
A lot of people don't know that.
Speaker 13 (30:22):
Yeah we I mean at times we've been pushing as
many as two hundred or twenty five hundred guns a
day out the door.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
Oh that's a lot of guns go out the door, Yeah,
each day.
Speaker 12 (30:34):
Each day. Yeah. Now that was at our height. We
slowed down a little now.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
Well the market's a little bit down right now.
Speaker 6 (30:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
I heard a story that you guys have like a
meeting in the morning and say, what do we have
in stock? How are we going to price it? Throw
it out and you're gonna throw out an email and
boom it hits, and it's like we're gonna move these
things today.
Speaker 12 (30:51):
You're not too far off.
Speaker 13 (30:53):
So our owner is still very involved and sometimes it
can be that simple, and that's how we operate at times.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Yeah, just look an what do we got, mark it down,
get it out the door. Yeah, yeah, what can we
do to any goods sitting in the warehouse?
Speaker 12 (31:04):
That's exactly right?
Speaker 13 (31:05):
And who you know, who can we get something to
it an avoridable price today?
Speaker 2 (31:09):
So how do you go about figuring out what guns
to make? I mean cause you guys are I mean,
like you say, you make ars, but you also got
your own pistols you make.
Speaker 13 (31:16):
Yeah, So we what we try to do and we
go we go at it from two avenues now.
Speaker 12 (31:21):
So now you know, we've.
Speaker 13 (31:23):
Always looked at what is what has a high barrier
of entry in the market, and how can we offer
that affordably? So at first it was AR fifteen's, you know,
back in the day, under one thousand dollars for an
AR fifteen was something that was very hard to do,
and we started offering them. I mean we make them
at half that price and all from at half that
price to people. And now we're moving that, like you said,
(31:43):
into handguns and into aks. And now Harrington and Richardson
is our retro brand, so they're offering M sixteen eight
one's and sixteen eighty two's, seven thirty threes. They just
came out with the Doe nine mil so all those things.
I mean, we look for the areas people, what do
people want that they can't get their hands on necessarily,
and we try to hit that and offer it to
(32:04):
people out of respectable price.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
I'm curious, how are the AK sales doing.
Speaker 13 (32:08):
They're down a little bit right now. We do make
a lot of five five to six and nine millimeters aks.
Speaker 12 (32:12):
Oh really that are still doing good.
Speaker 13 (32:15):
But the seven six two and five four five shortage
that we have right now, it has been a.
Speaker 12 (32:18):
Little tough on.
Speaker 2 (32:19):
Yeah, Ammo drives, that doesn't it?
Speaker 12 (32:21):
Yeah, one hundred percent.
Speaker 6 (32:23):
So as you look at.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
The marketplace right now, what's what's really happening, what's selling
well and kind of where are we moving.
Speaker 13 (32:32):
Right right now in this particular moment. I mean anything
that is meant to be suppressed or suppressors themselves. Yes,
so three hundred blackouts a big mover, and then five
five six guns that are designed and ready to be
suppressed are big movers as well.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
Is this it's got to be because of getting rid
of the tax.
Speaker 5 (32:51):
It is.
Speaker 2 (32:51):
It is so you get rid of that two hundred
dollar tacks, people will buy a can. The other thing
that's happening, and I'm going to ask you about this,
what about SBRs.
Speaker 12 (32:58):
Same thing.
Speaker 13 (32:59):
A lot of asvrs and guns that are designed to
be sbr or are moving well I shouldn't say designed,
but guns that are easy to turn into SBRs are moving.
So there's a big uptick in that. And this goes
back to YPSA was founded. It was founded to put
AR fifteens into common production, common use, so that they
would be unbannable.
Speaker 12 (33:19):
That's the whole reason why we offer them.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
How we do yeah, talk about that because people think
of you, yeah, use more sell guns now. Actually, when
you look at the culture and the reason for the company,
it's as much about pushing the Second Amendment and saying,
if we get enough of.
Speaker 6 (33:35):
These out there.
Speaker 2 (33:36):
They are clearly in common use. According to Heller decision,
it can't be banned.
Speaker 12 (33:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 13 (33:42):
So the actually the mission statement of the company is
freedom over profit. So we like to describe it as
spreading freedom. And again, like you said, the whole goal
of it was to sell as many AR fifteens as
we could to make sure that they were considered in
common use. And now hopefully that same thing is going
to apply to the suppressor market as well as the
short brailed rifle market.
Speaker 2 (34:02):
Interesting, all right, tell them about the factory and the
company where you guys are.
Speaker 13 (34:06):
Yeah, so we're out of Columbia, South Carolina, but we
have manufacturing. We have a lot of vertical integration, so
we make everything from the barrel, the buffer tubes. We
do all our analyzing and we're spread all over the
country for that, but everything comes into Columbia, South Carolina
to be assembled.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
Okay, in the Palmetto State, Yes, sir, palm Metta State Armory.
Here you go, sir, So where do you go from here?
As you kind of look you down the road, I
know you guys project out. You know, where's the market headed?
What's the interest?
Speaker 13 (34:36):
So, like I said, we're focusing on a lot of
the suppressor ready stuff, so the suppressor specific calibers, so
three thirty eight ARC is going to be one that's
on the horizon for us, as well as the eight
six blackout stuff.
Speaker 12 (34:49):
We're looking at those things.
Speaker 13 (34:50):
But we also have a couple different brands we have
if you remember Advanced Armament Co. They just came into
kind of our corporate umbrella, so we're happy to start
bringing their suppressors back and putting those suppressors back on
the market, and we've come out with three new ones
this year and they're all performing great. So really we're
moving towards We're still making quality products at a respectable price,
(35:15):
and now we're starting to make like the mid tier
level stuff, and that's kind of where we're running where
people who have been around the Palmetto State Armory and
they're ready to maybe step it up. We're starting to
offer that. We just made a new line called Saber
in the past couple of years, and that's see what
does that that's our new line of AR fifteen's. It
started as AAR fifteens has expanded a little bit, but
(35:36):
it comes with all the upgrades that we see our
customers do, so we wanted to offer that out of
the box from the get go. So like on an
AR fifteen, you get an upgraded bolt carrier group, you
get a Sprinko spring, you get ambidextross controls, you get
upgraded trigger and typically a cold hammer forage barrel.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
On those you also sell other brands of guns and
you get them in and I don't know, I'm just
looking at it from the outside looking in, it looks
like like sometimes when AUP company says, let's move some
guns out, let's get them out of here, and they
call you guys, say would you like these at a
super discount price?
Speaker 12 (36:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 13 (36:09):
So we have great relationships with our industry partners and
it's it's actually a beautiful thing about working at PSA
as your friends with everybody, right, But yeah, we tend
to be the people who will move a lot of
things at a very great price.
Speaker 12 (36:21):
And anybody knows thing is.
Speaker 2 (36:23):
If you get the mailing, and you should be on
the email list because you get this email every day.
If you get it and you say that looks interesting,
if you wait till tomorrow, it probably won't be there.
Speaker 6 (36:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 13 (36:33):
Yeah, And people think we do that to play with people,
but we really don't.
Speaker 12 (36:36):
We just want to move as many as we can.
Speaker 13 (36:38):
And like you said, if you don't get it that day,
sometimes it's going to be gone.
Speaker 2 (36:41):
Because it may be like you've got a hundred of them. Yeah,
it may not be a lot of them, and they
just proof they're gone.
Speaker 13 (36:46):
One hundred percent. Or sometimes it's a thousand and it's
the same same way.
Speaker 2 (36:49):
It could be a thousand and and you are offering
really good prices. I mean sometimes it's like I can't
believe you know, it's you got to buy this thing, man,
And so people are forwarding these emails to everybody. Look
at this, Look at this, look at this. It happens
all the time.
Speaker 13 (37:06):
Yeah, and again we want our mission not only to
apply to our products, but our our industry friends products
as well, as long as they're fine with it. So
most people know that, so they come to us when
they really want to move things.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
So what's the future for the company. Are you buying
other companies, gun companies or how are you going to
expand how do you grow?
Speaker 13 (37:24):
Well, we're doing a lot to grow, you know, just
on our home turf in Columbia, South Carolina. We're looking
at different buildings. We're still we're looking to get back
into AMMO production. If you don't know, we actually were
in AMMO production. And now with powder's getting tight, our
mission again is to provide quality, affordable ammos. So when
powder prices started going up, we didn't want to start
raising the prices of our AMMO. We wanted to still
(37:45):
be able to offer that at the price. So we
paused for a little bit. But we set up primer
production a couple of years ago.
Speaker 6 (37:51):
Wait.
Speaker 2 (37:51):
Wait, wait, you're making primers.
Speaker 12 (37:52):
Making our own primers in Columbia, South Carolina.
Speaker 2 (37:55):
Oh yes, wow, yeah, that's a big deal man.
Speaker 12 (37:58):
Yeah, that took a long time.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
Yeah that is. That's a lot harder than having a
powder company.
Speaker 13 (38:03):
Actually, yes, yes, So we're getting more powder in now.
So we're going to keep expanding on that AMO side.
We're going to keep expanding on that AMMO side.
Speaker 5 (38:11):
And then.
Speaker 12 (38:13):
Yeah, and then, as.
Speaker 13 (38:14):
You said, strategically acquiring companies that make sense for us.
All our whole thing is vertical integration, right, so if
there's a stick point for us, we'll acquire.
Speaker 12 (38:23):
That's when we'll start looking at different companies.
Speaker 2 (38:26):
Yeah sounds good. I sure appreciate your time.
Speaker 5 (38:29):
Justin you.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
You've explained it very well. And uh you know, it's
like hold of Cow. There's a whole lot more to
pal Meta State Army than I realized. So all right, well,
a good show for you.
Speaker 13 (38:41):
Yeah, it's been a great show. It's always I love
the public shows. We get to interact with the customer
directly and just learn your customers.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
Man, Yeah, they really are. All right, we'll get out
there and do it. We're almost over, but I appreciate
your time. All right, thank you, stay Army dot com.
Speaker 12 (38:55):
Or how yes or Palmata State Armory dot com.
Speaker 6 (38:57):
There you go, all right, all right, you take care,
Thanks so much.
Speaker 2 (39:01):
All right, don't go far. We are at the root
of booth at the NRA's annual meeting.
Speaker 3 (39:06):
Here.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
I'm Tom Gresham and this is gun talk. I'm having
so much fun here. I'm looking out the door of
this meeting room where I am, and there is a
father and a daughter and she looks like she's about
(39:26):
seven or eight, and she is handling some of these
little rifles out here at the NRA's annual meetings. Here
on the floor, it's a big exhibit hall and you
got a lot of the major manufacturers here with their
guns and a lot of families, I mean just a
lot of families. And it is the most polite place,
the most cordial place. I have several times told people said, look,
(39:49):
you could look across the room and find somebody point
at him. Just walk over there, people you never saw
before in your life, never met him, and just walk
up and say, hey, what do you see in this
interesting and you would be in for a twenty minute conversation,
just kindred spirits, shared values, one culture. And it doesn't
(40:10):
matter if they're male or female, younger, old, black, white,
purple pokedat. It just doesn't matter. Nobody cares. It is
maybe the least judgmental group I've ever been around. It's
very interesting. I mean, I do love the makeup around here.
So the other thing you find and yeah, you can
(40:31):
go to all these big boosts and see all the
cool big guns, but they are also a little bit tables.
Like somebody rents one table, small booth, and it's one
guy or one gal who's been working on something for
years in a garage or in a spare bedroom and
finally got it to a point where they could start
(40:53):
selling it. And they come here and they're showing it off.
I talked to a guy who was making portable shooting benches,
and it's three legged portable benches and screw the legs
in the bottom. And of this what looks like it's
a three inch thick tabletop. Man, thing looks like it
was weigh hundred pounds, nice and stable, real sturdy. But
(41:15):
the siren said, looks heavy. Come try to pick it up.
And you walk over and pick it up. There's nothing
to it. It's super light. It's hollow, stable but sturdy.
He said, yeah, I said, I worked on this for years.
I said, well, why why'd you do this? He said, well,
I kept looking at all the portable shooting benches and
I didn't like any of them. And I thought, well,
(41:36):
I could do better than that. Man, I love that spirit.
I can do better than that. I think I can
do that. I mean, it's it's the Bill Gates Microsoft thing.
It's every great inventor of all time. I can do that.
I can do better than that. I got an idea,
and you get to go around and talk to everybody
and see this cool stuff. And I mean, you never know,
maybe some little widget somebody brings out and then the
(41:59):
next year, you see it on one of the guns
from a major manufacturer. Because they're cruising around, they're looking
at what's out here too. It's part of the fun here.
Now you cannot buy guns here, although you can, as
we learned last week the gallery guns folks from Davidson's.
They have a booth and you could find a gun
you liked at exhibit here from a manufacturer, go over
(42:21):
there and order it and think it would get shipped
to your firearm store, your dealer in your area, and
then in a few days you go pick it up.
So that's new. That's a new thing it's been doing here.
But it's not a gun show in the form like
you can buy guns here. So actually all the guns
that are on the floor here are deactivated. Whether it's
(42:43):
whether the firing pin has been removed or shortened or whatever,
but somehow they've all been made inert and they cannot work,
which is a good thing. You got a lot of
people handling guns. But it's a cool thing. And let's
see the next year we're going to be in Atlanta
and I would just throw it out.
Speaker 6 (43:00):
You want to think about going.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
It's great fun. A lot of people, not only come
from just the local area, but they come from all
over the country. They make it a point and once
they come, they keep coming back. They go year after
year to the NRARA show. You get to see all
the cool stuff and you see a lot of the people.
You go, oh, I remember Joe, I met him over there,
and then make friends. You go hunting with him, you
go shooting with them. So anyway, you might consider doing
(43:23):
that and next year doing that going over to the
NRA show in Atlantam. All right, quick break here. When
we come back, we're going to have some news actually
this time from gun Talk itself. Some of the things
that we are doing. Something brand new, and frankly, I
think it's pretty huge. I think you want to want
to hear that. All right, don't go far. Gun Talk
(43:43):
over you. Right back from the NRARA Show.
From the range to the field. CZ firearms are built
to perform when it counts. Known for accuracy, durability, and reliability,
CZ stands apart, CZ built for those who demand more
CZ firearms dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Yeah, I'm still talking about guns and we're still having fun.
I'm Tom Gresch. It's gun talk. That's what we did.
People say, how can you talk for guns for three hours?
Speaker 3 (00:25):
No?
Speaker 2 (00:25):
No, no, I talk for about guns for twelve hours a day,
pretty much the whole time. We're at the Ruger booth
at the NRA's annual meetings in Houston, talking right now
with Taber Bright Tabor. I was listening to the lead
in on this and it sets something about why should
you own an AR fifteen. I had a flashback. I
was thinking about you know, we've been talking about AR
fifteen's for a long long time and they were kind
(00:48):
of niche in the marketplace thirty years ago. And there
was one point where something changed. And for me, it
was when Ruger brought out an AR fifteen. I said,
when Ruger has an AR fifteen, it has gone completely mainstream, right.
Speaker 4 (01:06):
Yeah, it really has. I mean I can't remember the
years ago. I mean because again I started behind a
gun counter at sixteen and looking at you know, Soldier,
Fortune magazine and those things, and Ronnie Barrett with his
guns on the cover, and you know, Eugene articles about
Eugene Stoner and ArmaLite and AR fifteen, yes, and all
of those guns. And I was I mean, from the
(01:27):
time I was that young, I was hooked on AR
fifteen's So I've always had this great love of them.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, but it was smaller company, absolutely, where there was Colt,
but for the most part of the smaller companies, it
was not Ruger.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
It was not main you know, they really didn't become
mainstream until the Internet and social media and those things
really grew and people saw all the different things you
can do with them and compete and hunt and protect.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Well, people started to understand them.
Speaker 5 (01:55):
Yeah, absolutely, all right.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
So Ruger comes out with the AR fifteen and they've
had several versions and all of that, and now you've
got a completely new thing. Something new has happened. You
bought Anderson Manufacturing, which has a fabulous manufacturing facility, and
you've moved all your production of your AR platform to
that new factory.
Speaker 4 (02:17):
All MSRs, you know, from our small frame to our
five five to six three hundred blackout all small frame
or all I'm sorry. All MSR rifles are now built
in hebron Kentucky. We have you know, one of the
great things that came out of that acquisition is the
eighty seven employees that we kept because they are really
just passionate. They just wanted deliver a good gun. And
(02:39):
what the first two models we've come out with, you know,
have one that's a little bit more basic with some
basic M four furniture and a sort of lightweight style
handguard that doesn't have a full twelve o'clock rail. And
then we have a next level up there's still similar
price points, nothing crazy. One has magpole furniture with a
full twelve o'clock rail. Both of those guns can be
(03:00):
bought for under six hundred dollars on the street. What
yeah called the Harrier Harrier Rifles.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
Why a new name?
Speaker 5 (03:09):
Well, you know, you you moved to a new facility.
Speaker 4 (03:15):
You want to you know, shine the penny a little bit,
so to speak. New names, new people, new manufacturing location.
Speaker 6 (03:23):
New model the people to look at it.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
Yes, and what we've done is is this is what
was important to me is unfortunately towards the end of
the previous manufacturer, some of the guns were not the
greatest things on the world, and there was sort of
this stigmatism with that facility. So it was important to
me to eliminate that ins stigmatism immediately. But I wanted
to do it. We wanted to do it at a
(03:46):
price point. And that's what was really important is I
was really really stringent on them about making sure they
did exactly what we said they were going to do.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
So how did that wark were the employees. They're okay
with you bring it in and say, hey, we're gonna
make really good guns.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
Oh well, so I you know, when we first start
turning the machines back on and started making chips, before
every shift started, I addressed the entire shift and I said, look,
this is important that the crosshairs are on us. We
need to deliver a solid quality product at a price point.
So if you're not comfortable putting it in a box,
(04:23):
don't don't sign your name on that inspection sticker or
that end invoice or whatever.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
If you, as the boss are okay, if they say look,
this shouldn't be shipped out.
Speaker 5 (04:31):
They're losing their job. If they don't say that for me. Huh.
Speaker 2 (04:36):
There's a lot of places they're thinking, well, I got
to get this thing shipped, no matter what.
Speaker 4 (04:39):
No, no, no, no, no, that's that's you know. The
Harrier rifle is exactly what we meant it to be.
A five hundred dollars street price, you know, no joke, straightforward,
blue collar working man's gun to work.
Speaker 5 (04:52):
It's just gonna work.
Speaker 4 (04:53):
It shoots modestly in that one to one point five
ma with goods quality AMO, it's got all the adaptability
of any other AR fifteen on the market, and it's
one hundred percent American made.
Speaker 5 (05:06):
That was also important to me.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
Now, other companies do find things with price point guns
with products made from other parts of the world.
Speaker 5 (05:14):
Were ruger.
Speaker 4 (05:15):
That's not happening. This gun is one hundred percent American made.
And we filtered all of those things out of the
building before we made the first gun.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Wow. Okay, so you got two models.
Speaker 4 (05:26):
Two models right now, and the engineering team got a
little little They were.
Speaker 5 (05:33):
Were screaming for stuff to do.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
So my partners in crime, Matt Wilson Andrew Gore, Mark Bailey,
we laid out the next eighteen months of models to
come so you're you know, if you're you're sitting at home,
you're gone, where did SFA are go? Or where did
three hundred blackout go? How about you know some of
the new calibers. Just be patient. What I can tell
(05:56):
you is is we are all solid gun people.
Speaker 6 (05:59):
That you want to out just as much as everybody else.
Speaker 4 (06:03):
You have no idea because I'm not a patient person time,
not even a little bit. So you'll see small Frame
come back, and you'll see a bevy of new features. Uh,
you'll see some new calibers, and we have you know,
right now we.
Speaker 5 (06:19):
Have the two working man guns out.
Speaker 4 (06:21):
We've already planned three levels above that, from price point
to features to you know, all of the cool guy stuff,
the better.
Speaker 5 (06:29):
Triggers and the.
Speaker 4 (06:30):
Folding stocks and all of the things you can think of.
We're talking about every bit of that.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
Because you know what people want and you don't. You're
not waiting till next shots should release things, and they're
gonna be coming out throughout.
Speaker 4 (06:41):
As quickly as I can get them made. You know,
one of the things that happens when you take a
facility that's been shut down for a period of time
is it's not just turn the switch and turn things
back on because things lose, inspection processes, programs go away,
measuring devices have to be re and then you also
bring in a different mindset and a different group of
(07:03):
engineers that have their own things in the Ruger way,
and we needed to teach that to the great staff
that's there. You know, we've got Laddie to Pass, who's
just an amazing manufacturing engineer that is also a huge
AR fifteen fan, and again he's leading the engineering team
over there.
Speaker 5 (07:22):
They just want to deliver great guns.
Speaker 4 (07:24):
We've got Brandon in the in the quality side of things,
and he's been so particular and so stringent about the
rules that we've all put in place of what it
can and can't look like before it leaves the building.
And we've had to make a couple of trips in
there to make sure he's not being over zealous with
those things.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
It's okay, you can that we do have to write
a few guns now, right.
Speaker 4 (07:49):
Right, And we had to relax some of that because
not that he was doing anything wrong, but he was
being particular, which is what I personally.
Speaker 7 (07:58):
He was trying to make sure it was the way
you want and he was following those orders, and he's
gotten so good at it that now we can trust
him to back We back off a little bit, let
him make the calls.
Speaker 5 (08:10):
And again, it.
Speaker 4 (08:11):
Is a pretty basic five hundred dollars gun that's going
out there, but it looks good and it does everything
it's meant to do.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
I am reading between the lines and just hearing your voice,
and I can imagine that these folk at this factory
are really happy now.
Speaker 5 (08:27):
They seem to be in terms of.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Saying, we can really turn out a quality product we're
proud of.
Speaker 4 (08:32):
Yeah, and you know this is a backup just a second.
Speaker 5 (08:37):
I grew up behind a gun counter.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
I grew up on AR fifteen's eight seventy pump shotguns
in nineteen eleven. So Ar fifteen's are my thing. And
when you know, my boss has said, hey, Tabor, we're
going to give you this run with it and deliver
a solid product.
Speaker 5 (08:54):
And then it's not me. It's not all me.
Speaker 4 (08:56):
I tend to say that in conversation just because of
the way we're talking, but really I'm surrounded by this
amazing team of people in Hebrew and may it in
and we've come together and delivered a solid product.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
They're not the only people having fun right now.
Speaker 5 (09:09):
No, they're not.
Speaker 4 (09:11):
I You know, I have to pinch myself every time
I'm on the plant floor because I talk about all
these high spots of my life. You know that when
I was at Smith and Wesson and you walk down
the ramp into the into the production floor and you're
standing on that giant logo on the ramp, right, you know,
that's one being in Ronnie Barrett's office after growing up
watching him on the cover of magazines and things, some
(09:35):
of the Wounded Warrior hunts, things like that. And then
I pull off the partnership with Dead Air and deliver
the great products that happen to win a Golden Bullseye
Award this year and now Harrier and how it's been
received and looking at the backworder, you know, because again
the AR market's kind of soft right now because people
were delivering either really expensive product or really cheap, not
(09:58):
so great product right and they needed a happy.
Speaker 5 (10:01):
Medium, and we've delivered that. The team has delivered.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
That exciting stuff. Can't wait to see what's coming next.
Same you want to get it out the door.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
I've seen it on paper, I've seen some drawings now
I want to touch feel shoot.
Speaker 6 (10:16):
Right. Thank you so much.
Speaker 5 (10:17):
Thank you for having me here, man, Thank you for
having us.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
This is terrific. Thank you for having me in the booth.
All right, we're at the Ruder booth and we're at
the ISSANDUEL meetings here in Houston, Texas.
Speaker 6 (10:26):
And we'll come back.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
We're going to talk about good guns and cool guns,
and yeah we're gonna talk about some old guns. Be
right back.
Speaker 8 (10:44):
One rifle every reason. The Ruger American Gen two is
your go anywhere, do everything. Bold gun available in multiple calibers,
with a smooth, Bold, crisp trigger and modern aconomics. This
is the rifle you grab, whether it's your camp, the
bag forty or a quick trip to the range. Accurate,
affordable American The Ruger American Jen two Your hunt starts
(11:09):
a year.
Speaker 9 (11:16):
Want the latest and guns, gear and shooting infos straight
into your inbox. Sign up for the gun Talk newsletter.
Get insider access to reviews, exclusive deals, training tips, and
the hottest stories from the range, delivered every week. Don't
miss out on the news and offers every shooter needs
to know. It's fast, free and easy. Sign up today
(11:36):
at gun talk dot com. That's gun Talk dot com.
Speaker 10 (11:44):
Celebrate America's two hundred and fiftieth anniversary by competing in
the NRA America's Rifle Challenge ARC Across America National competition.
Build your skills, challenge friends and family and see where
you rank across the country. Enter more than once to
improve your score and earn bragging rights on the leaderboard.
Every match is a chance to win prizes and sharpen
your marksmanship. Learn more at ARC dot NRA dot org.
(12:09):
Celebrate and exercise your rights through competition.
Speaker 11 (12:15):
Owning, shooting, and carrying firearms is your responsibility. Range Ready
Studios offers gun training classes taught by top level instructors
with real world experience. Range Ready delivers basic and advanced
classes for pistol and rifle. We also offer a lady's
only handgun course. All these training classes at range Ready
(12:35):
prepare you to use your gun and win the fight.
Find us at Rangereadystudios dot com.
Speaker 6 (12:41):
To learn more.
Speaker 8 (12:44):
Precision isn't a suggestion, it's the standard. The Ruger Precision
Rifle is built for the long game, match grade accuracy,
fully adjustable chassis, and build to last a lifetime. This
isn't just another long range gun, a system engineered to
go along, shoot tight and own the podium, whether it's paper,
(13:06):
steel or out past one thousand. You've got the tool,
the Ruger Precision rifle miles ahead.
Speaker 3 (13:16):
All right here.
Speaker 2 (13:27):
Yeah, we're kind of broadcasting over barb bar right now,
hoping that signal gets through. We're in the Ruger booth
at the NRA's annual meetings. When you do these things remote,
you never know what you're going to get. So if
I go away for a minute, count yourself lucky you
don't have to listen to me for a little while.
That's okay, we're trying now by a long long time friend,
Marquis from the NRA. How are you doing, partner?
Speaker 6 (13:48):
I am doing great, Tom, It's great to be here
with you.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
Okay, you currently have like this incredibly long title because
you keep they keep throwing things at you. So what
are you these days?
Speaker 6 (13:56):
Yeah? So I'm the director of editorial and Public Affairs,
and you know, I'm running the editorial staff doing American
Rifleman television still the producer host, and then I've got
a good team on the public affair side, trying to
get Enery's message out there.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
When did you start with NRA Well.
Speaker 6 (14:14):
I started as a volunteer at the museum in nineteen
eighty eight, No, nineteen eighty nine, sorry, And then for
I think seven to fifty one an hour, they had
me scraping boogers off the glass at the Nurrey Museum.
The job was a lot more janitorial, they said, curatorial assistant.
It was more janitorial. Tom ended up.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Being the editor of American Riflemen and then going on
from there. So you've been doing this quite a while.
What got you started in firearms in the first place.
Speaker 6 (14:42):
Well, I grew up shooting and hunting a little bit,
but then I went to boy Scout camp and I
learned about small boer rifle and so this is back
when rifle shooting merit badge was three position shooting, and
so I really really loved doing it. Got into Civil
War reenacting, and then my dream was to run the
(15:04):
boy Scout rifle range at Campowman and the shotgun range,
you know, But I, you know, I'd shot a lot
of guns by then. But they handed a twenty year old,
twenty one year old the keys to his own rifle
and shotgun range. Tom. But that's that's how I became
an UNERA certified instructor.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
So there you go.
Speaker 6 (15:21):
Yeah, and I had to help my friend Phil Schreyer
on weekends at the museum with tours and four age groups.
It was wonderful. You also have.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
A love of history that goes along with this.
Speaker 6 (15:32):
I do. Yeah, we you know. I was a history
major University of Maryland, grew up in Maryland, going to
Civil War battlefields Smithsonian, DC, and I've always had a
passion for it. And one of the things that this
job has allowed me to do is to tie guns
in history together.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
Yes, and I talk about that a good bit. I said,
look for people may not understand it. For a lot
of people in the gun world, they are actually not
just amateur but actually quite accomplished historians through the firearms.
Speaker 6 (16:06):
Absolutely. Yeah. There's a guy, Joel Bowie. He lives up
in New England and he's a gung guy American Society
of Arms Collectors, but he actually did battlefield archaeology for
Lexington and Concord and the battlefield Row Road back to
Boston where Redcoats got shot by angry Yankees angry Americans
(16:27):
and most of the guns were long barreled, smooth bore fowlers,
but they were different bullet sizes, so he can tell
one guy was at Lexington Green and also for Putnam's
Revenge the same they ambushed the column. That guy was
in both places because they have his bullets. Oh yeah, yeah,
(16:50):
So you want to talk about real American.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
History, Well, you know, and I was thinking about that,
and yes, you can track all the battles and all
the history, but then there's a different level of that,
and you find it in surprising places and in surprising people.
The one that I always think about is I was
doing a photo shoot in Montana with Dad, was doing
(17:14):
a story with Hank Williams Jr. And he would reach
into his vault and pull out one of his mini sharps,
original sharps, and he'd say, well, this one was made
in such and such, and it was shipped to this
hardware store and such and such where it was sold
to so and so who took it out in a wagon.
(17:34):
He knew everything that happened with that. It was astounding.
Speaker 6 (17:39):
Yeah. So gun collecting is just such such a rich
field where you can you can pretty much focus on
anything you want, but you know, you can you can
drill down, so you know, you can have every variation
of the inland m one car being from old Fortune.
So so ner A is so wonderful. You know, Eddy
Eagles safety and Education on commerce for the legislative fight.
(18:02):
But we also have our gun collecting department, and there
are eleven affiliated gun collecting clubs here that put together
exhibits just for here. Now, these these aren't museum guns.
These are guns that belong to.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
Guys like privately own guns.
Speaker 6 (18:15):
Yeah, they belonged to guys that live in Ohio, Ohio
Gun Collectors Association or Colt Collectors. So great display everything
you ever wanted to know about the illinam one car being.
And across the aisle there's a cult side hammer percussion
revolver that was owned by William C. Church. Colonel Church
the editor of the Army and Navy Gazette who founded
(18:37):
the National Rifle Association with this Powell General Wingate in
the offices of the Army and Navy Journal in New York.
Oh yeah, I.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Mean, and this is history that you could pick up
absolutely and if you wanted to, you could shoot.
Speaker 6 (18:51):
Well. You know, it's funny you say that. Ed Friedman
took over as the editor in chief of American riflemen.
And he worked with our old friend Rick Hacker, you
remember Ricka, and he did shooting safe queens. So in
a moment of insanity, they took the Brett out nineteen
thirty four gold plated in grave presented to Chuck Yeager
(19:13):
by the Cuban air Minister. That's in our museum, and
they shot at Tom.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
No.
Speaker 6 (19:20):
The problem was I had meetings all day that day
and it went back in the case, and I might
not kidnassed out on it. I did so. No, Yeah,
but I knew Chuck Colonel Yeger. I mean, he used
to come to the annual meetings all the time. Nicest
man in the world. And it is true what they say.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
What he said his book about his eyesight. Our good
friend Ray Elgin, who hunted with him, he said, yeah,
it's in a blind with him one time and he
said there's still pitch dark in the morning and says,
Chuck is good, resais. Chuck says, yeah, that's deer out there.
And he said, Ray looked out there and says it's
Pitt's black. He says, come on, Chuck, he says, no,
it's an a point out there. Come on, it's pitch dark.
(20:02):
You can't see that. So it's like fifteen minutes later
he looks at there goes, here's Nate point Buck out there.
Speaker 6 (20:08):
Yeah, the dude really could see like that, And it's funny.
That reminds me of story Jim Norell, who worked with
us for years. He was having tea with Bill Jordan
and his mom and they're sitting there in the kitchen.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
Jordan, the famous Border Patrol one fastraw guy, wrote the
book No second place winner, Unbelievable Character Okay.
Speaker 6 (20:29):
And an entery field rep. He appeared on the cover
of American Rifleman in his blue jeans with a turkey
over her shoulder, so somehow he managed. Anyway, They're just
sitting there and there's a fly buzzing around, and his
mother reached up out of there, and she's like ninety
years old and just catches the fly in her fingertips,
snatches it out of the air, snatches it right out
(20:50):
of the air, and then turned and you know, Jim
asked about it, and she's like, what not. Everybody can
do that, right right?
Speaker 2 (20:58):
Bill told me similar stories about his mom, which goes
to the whole you could shoot as much as Bill
Jordan or Jerry Mitchlick. You'll still never be as good
as they are.
Speaker 6 (21:09):
They have a gene we don't, Tom, they do.
Speaker 2 (21:12):
You know, it's a whether it's you know, fast twitch
gene or whatever. It's like, yeah, you know, Uh, Doug Kanang, Yeah,
I had people say, we know, if I had the sponsorships,
I had that much money, you know, I could be
that good.
Speaker 6 (21:23):
No, you couldn't, No, Doug, Doug, Doug Kanig one of
the world's nicest men.
Speaker 4 (21:27):
Uh.
Speaker 6 (21:28):
But when when it's shooting time, he's he's in a
different place than you and me.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
Well, a factors ray out and Toby's yeah, he's at
Whittington Center. It's a Doug is shooting offhand with a
rifle and the hating targets at a thousand yards off hand,
and nobody can do that. Well, yeah, Doug can. Yeah,
that's why we know his name.
Speaker 6 (21:47):
All right.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
We're talking with Mark if Uh, editor of American Rifleman.
He's hitting charge of publications, he's in charge of all
sorts of stuff public affairs at NRA, and he's a
gun collector and a good friend. So don't go any
we're talking. When we come back in just a minute. Actually,
we had a great hunt in Alaska one time, and
then we had a most interesting quail hunt that we
(22:08):
probably can't tell all the details about.
Speaker 6 (22:10):
I signed it in Da Tom.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Let's just say that it was an interesting walk to
try to find the cottages after we left the bar. Yeah.
Sometimes we'll tell that story back with here with visit
with Mark Keith. During the break, you started to were
reminding me of a meeting we had that we're planning
(22:35):
out your TV show or something.
Speaker 6 (22:36):
What was that? So you and I were at the
NSGIP NSGW show, the Wholesaler Show, and you had just
found out that you were getting a television show on
the Outdoor Channel, and I had also found out that
I was getting a show on the Outdoor Channel, and
we just sat there in the Texas sun and talked
about how not to step on each other's toes too much.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
Yeah, it's it worked out pretty well.
Speaker 6 (22:58):
It has.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
It's like, you know, I love it. People say, were
you guys and competitors? No, we're friends. Yeah, it's a
whole different deal, right. All right, So you did a
story some years ago, and we got to do this
because it kind of coincides with our two hundred and
fiftieth anniversary of the country.
Speaker 6 (23:12):
Yeah, so here in Houston, you know, it's NA celebrates
USA two fifty And you know, the entire American Revolution
started in April nineteen, seventeen seventy five because Major Pitt
Cairn and his red coated thugs decided they wanted to
take guns away from Americans. And we know how that
worked out.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
Yeah, it didn't work out so well for them.
Speaker 6 (23:32):
Okay, so, but but guns have been in the United
States since there were Europeans. And so I did the
story called Ten Guns that Shaped America, and I leaded
it all. Led off the story with what we thought
was the John Alden wheel lock. And you know, they
thought it came over on the Mayflower, and you know,
(23:52):
everybody thought that was true. And so we started lately
looking at the gun and by the gun, not the
story Tom that wheel lock was made in aut sixteen eighty.
Oh yeah, yeah, Pilgrims were dead by then. Now away
it came over on the may Fly.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Yeah, it's another gun show, lie.
Speaker 6 (24:08):
Yeah, yeah, but then you start looking at guns and
I misspoke. It wasn't Putnam, he was a different guy.
Captain Parker commanded the Lexington Militia Company, and his musket
is at the Massachusetts State Capitol. For many years it
hung in the main chamber with a trigger lock on it,
you know, because a musket with nothing in it and
(24:29):
no flint.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
Could go off at any time.
Speaker 6 (24:32):
Dangerous, tom absolutely dangerous. But then you know, I went
through and I talked about the American long rifle, and
I think one of the most important guns in American
history is the gun used by Timothy Murphy. He was
under the command of Dan Morgan, my favorite foul Mouth
founding father. He's the guy who won the Battle of
Coupans for us. But Timothy Murphy took three shots at
(24:55):
Briader General Simon Fraser during the Battle of Saratoga in
seventy seven seventy seven, and took him three shots, but
he hit him mortally wounded. The legend goes that Morgan
said he's a brave man, but he has to die.
More likely profanity was involved with and Morgan. But Simon
(25:15):
Fraser's hit, the British counter attack fails, we win the
Battle of Saratoga for going surrenders. The French come into
the war and as a whole new ball game.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Okay, so it was Attorney Point and actually the founding
of our country.
Speaker 6 (25:28):
Absolutely absolutely so. And then you kind of go through,
you know, other seminal guns in this story, and again
it's ten guns of shaped America, and you go into
the Winchester seventy three, obviously the gun that won the West,
when really the gun that won the West was probably
a trapdoor carbing in the hands of an illiterate Irish
immigrant on the American West. But then you know, you
(25:51):
start getting into the twentieth century and there's some great
guns people need to know about there even before the
twentieth century. There's the Gatling guns commanded by John Parker,
right machine gun Parker who supported Roosevelt's attack at San
Juan Hill and brought America into the americith century. And
we have one of those guns at our museum. Wow.
And I've shot one other of them too, but I
(26:12):
can't say where it is. But then you know, you
get into everybody says that Alvin York had a nineteen
seventeen Enfield because his regiment had one. Well, I talked
to his sons, George Washington and Andrew Jackson York at
an enter ratio and they swear that daddy. Can you
imagine I've got ninety year old men calling their dad daddy? Right,
(26:34):
shot an O three Springfield because Daddy didn't cott into
Pete sites.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
Sergeant York yep A No three Springfield.
Speaker 6 (26:41):
Wow? So uh And the monument on the state Capitol
grounds very clearly you know three in the family was involved.
So okay, So either pabue, either the book guys are wrong,
or the family's wrong.
Speaker 5 (26:53):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
Go with the family every time. All right, All right,
picked one or two more recent guns that we got
to talk about.
Speaker 6 (26:59):
Yeah, so I would say the M one Grand used
by a guy named Day Turner during the Battle of
the Bulge. She was a draftee, a sergeant, and he
basically wiped out a German infantry platoon by himself. When
his grand ran dry. He bayoneted a guy and the
bannit was stuck, so he grabbed a lantern and threw
(27:20):
it down the stairs and burned a bunch of Germans,
and once they went outside on fire, rolling in the snow,
he bayonetted them to death. He was a bad dude,
he was, and sadly he still remains in Belgium because
he was killed later on trying to save a fellow soldier.
But that's an American rifle in the spirit of the
American Warrior. One of the other guns, we call it
(27:41):
the banana I think it's watermelon and coconut rifle, a
very early cold AAR fifteen select a fire and they
would take this rifle and they would demonstrate it to
foreign governments and people like that, and they blow up
coconuts with it. Because of the twist rate, the five
five six two two three was very unstable to blow
him up. Everyone's like, oh, we got to have that,
(28:02):
and uh so that's bizarre and uh oh gosh. The
famous Air Force uh uh general he was chief of
staff at the Air Force. He was at a picnic
on a Virginia farm and the and the watermelon coconut
rifle was there and they shot a watermelon and of
course it exploded as the bullet was tumbling, and uh
(28:23):
they said generally, you wanna you wanta, you wanna eat
the other one, and then he said, no, let's eat
the son of a beep yep. But that that was
that's that's that gun in that watermelon put the United
States on the path of adoption of the gun that
we know as the M sixteen and the M four.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
Amazing, amazing stuff. All right, I'm gonna kick you out
the door. Okay, Tom, We're gonna keep doing this because
you're not not only can do this for hours, We
have done this for hours.
Speaker 6 (28:48):
Yeah, and uh sometimes it's worth listening to rarely.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
But there you go, Mark Keith, I think there's a pleasure,
my friend. You take care all right, We're gonna do
a hot swap here of the microphone. We've got to
hand this thing over here. There we go. Justin put
that on if you would. This this is what you
take care of. Mark.
Speaker 6 (29:07):
This is what you call live radio.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
Justin. We've got Justin Isabas Shars, Yes, sir, Okay, Justin
Bashers from Palmetta State Armory. This is how the sausage
gets made. You guys are just behind the scenes watching
it because we are live all over the country right
now doing this thing.
Speaker 6 (29:22):
Let's start off with this.
Speaker 2 (29:25):
Most people get your mailings that I know, get your
mailings every day. But for those who don't, what is
Palmetta State.
Speaker 12 (29:31):
Armory, Well, Palulmetto State Armory.
Speaker 13 (29:33):
We are a fairly new gun company and industry, and
the main thing we're focused on is spreading freedom to
as much Americans as possible. So the way we accomplish
that mission is we make quality, American made firearms and
we offer them at a very affordable price.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
And a lot of people would think of you and
know you as we would call a mail order house
online place where you can buy guns. But you said
it correctly, and people need to understand that you're a
gun maker. You're not just somebody who sells other people's guns.
Speaker 12 (30:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 13 (30:06):
We make a wide variety of products. I mean primarily
AR fifteen's, but we're expanding that every day. We make handguns,
we make ak platform rifle.
Speaker 6 (30:15):
We make a lot of guns, Yeah, a lot.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
The reality is you're actually one of the bigger gun makers.
Speaker 5 (30:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 12 (30:21):
A lot of people don't know that.
Speaker 13 (30:22):
Yeah we I mean at times we've been pushing as
many as two hundred or twenty five hundred guns a
day out the door.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
Oh that's a lot of guns go out the door, Yeah,
each day.
Speaker 12 (30:34):
Each day. Yeah. Now that was at our height. We
slowed down a little now.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
Well the market's a little bit down right now.
Speaker 6 (30:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
I heard a story that you guys have like a
meeting in the morning and say, what do we have
in stock? How are we going to price it? Throw
it out and you're gonna throw out an email and
boom it hits, and it's like we're gonna move these
things today.
Speaker 12 (30:51):
You're not too far off.
Speaker 13 (30:53):
So our owner is still very involved and sometimes it
can be that simple, and that's how we operate at times.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Yeah, just look an what do we got, mark it down,
get it out the door. Yeah, yeah, what can we
do to any goods sitting in the warehouse?
Speaker 12 (31:04):
That's exactly right?
Speaker 13 (31:05):
And who you know, who can we get something to
it an avoridable price today?
Speaker 2 (31:09):
So how do you go about figuring out what guns
to make? I mean cause you guys are I mean,
like you say, you make ars, but you also got
your own pistols you make.
Speaker 13 (31:16):
Yeah, So we what we try to do and we
go we go at it from two avenues now.
Speaker 12 (31:21):
So now you know, we've.
Speaker 13 (31:23):
Always looked at what is what has a high barrier
of entry in the market, and how can we offer
that affordably? So at first it was AR fifteen's, you know,
back in the day, under one thousand dollars for an
AR fifteen was something that was very hard to do,
and we started offering them. I mean we make them
at half that price and all from at half that
price to people. And now we're moving that, like you said,
(31:43):
into handguns and into aks. And now Harrington and Richardson
is our retro brand, so they're offering M sixteen eight
one's and sixteen eighty two's, seven thirty threes. They just
came out with the Doe nine mil so all those things.
I mean, we look for the areas people, what do
people want that they can't get their hands on necessarily,
and we try to hit that and offer it to
(32:04):
people out of respectable price.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
I'm curious, how are the AK sales doing.
Speaker 13 (32:08):
They're down a little bit right now. We do make
a lot of five five to six and nine millimeters aks.
Speaker 12 (32:12):
Oh really that are still doing good.
Speaker 13 (32:15):
But the seven six two and five four five shortage
that we have right now, it has been a.
Speaker 12 (32:18):
Little tough on.
Speaker 2 (32:19):
Yeah, Ammo drives, that doesn't it?
Speaker 12 (32:21):
Yeah, one hundred percent.
Speaker 6 (32:23):
So as you look at.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
The marketplace right now, what's what's really happening, what's selling
well and kind of where are we moving.
Speaker 13 (32:32):
Right right now in this particular moment. I mean anything
that is meant to be suppressed or suppressors themselves. Yes,
so three hundred blackouts a big mover, and then five
five six guns that are designed and ready to be
suppressed are big movers as well.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
Is this it's got to be because of getting rid
of the tax.
Speaker 5 (32:51):
It is.
Speaker 2 (32:51):
It is so you get rid of that two hundred
dollar tacks, people will buy a can. The other thing
that's happening, and I'm going to ask you about this,
what about SBRs.
Speaker 12 (32:58):
Same thing.
Speaker 13 (32:59):
A lot of asvrs and guns that are designed to
be sbr or are moving well I shouldn't say designed,
but guns that are easy to turn into SBRs are moving.
So there's a big uptick in that. And this goes
back to YPSA was founded. It was founded to put
AR fifteens into common production, common use, so that they
would be unbannable.
Speaker 12 (33:19):
That's the whole reason why we offer them.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
How we do yeah, talk about that because people think
of you, yeah, use more sell guns now. Actually, when
you look at the culture and the reason for the company,
it's as much about pushing the Second Amendment and saying,
if we get enough of.
Speaker 6 (33:35):
These out there.
Speaker 2 (33:36):
They are clearly in common use. According to Heller decision,
it can't be banned.
Speaker 12 (33:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 13 (33:42):
So the actually the mission statement of the company is
freedom over profit. So we like to describe it as
spreading freedom. And again, like you said, the whole goal
of it was to sell as many AR fifteens as
we could to make sure that they were considered in
common use. And now hopefully that same thing is going
to apply to the suppressor market as well as the
short brailed rifle market.
Speaker 2 (34:02):
Interesting, all right, tell them about the factory and the
company where you guys are.
Speaker 13 (34:06):
Yeah, so we're out of Columbia, South Carolina, but we
have manufacturing. We have a lot of vertical integration, so
we make everything from the barrel, the buffer tubes. We
do all our analyzing and we're spread all over the
country for that, but everything comes into Columbia, South Carolina
to be assembled.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
Okay, in the Palmetto State, Yes, sir, palm Metta State Armory.
Here you go, sir, So where do you go from here?
As you kind of look you down the road, I
know you guys project out. You know, where's the market headed?
What's the interest?
Speaker 13 (34:36):
So, like I said, we're focusing on a lot of
the suppressor ready stuff, so the suppressor specific calibers, so
three thirty eight ARC is going to be one that's
on the horizon for us, as well as the eight
six blackout stuff.
Speaker 12 (34:49):
We're looking at those things.
Speaker 13 (34:50):
But we also have a couple different brands we have
if you remember Advanced Armament Co. They just came into
kind of our corporate umbrella, so we're happy to start
bringing their suppressors back and putting those suppressors back on
the market, and we've come out with three new ones
this year and they're all performing great. So really we're
moving towards We're still making quality products at a respectable price,
(35:15):
and now we're starting to make like the mid tier
level stuff, and that's kind of where we're running where
people who have been around the Palmetto State Armory and
they're ready to maybe step it up. We're starting to
offer that. We just made a new line called Saber
in the past couple of years, and that's see what
does that that's our new line of AR fifteen's. It
started as AAR fifteens has expanded a little bit, but
(35:36):
it comes with all the upgrades that we see our
customers do, so we wanted to offer that out of
the box from the get go. So like on an
AR fifteen, you get an upgraded bolt carrier group, you
get a Sprinko spring, you get ambidextross controls, you get
upgraded trigger and typically a cold hammer forage barrel.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
On those you also sell other brands of guns and
you get them in and I don't know, I'm just
looking at it from the outside looking in, it looks
like like sometimes when AUP company says, let's move some
guns out, let's get them out of here, and they
call you guys, say would you like these at a
super discount price?
Speaker 12 (36:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 13 (36:09):
So we have great relationships with our industry partners and
it's it's actually a beautiful thing about working at PSA
as your friends with everybody, right, But yeah, we tend
to be the people who will move a lot of
things at a very great price.
Speaker 12 (36:21):
And anybody knows thing is.
Speaker 2 (36:23):
If you get the mailing, and you should be on
the email list because you get this email every day.
If you get it and you say that looks interesting,
if you wait till tomorrow, it probably won't be there.
Speaker 6 (36:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 13 (36:33):
Yeah, And people think we do that to play with people,
but we really don't.
Speaker 12 (36:36):
We just want to move as many as we can.
Speaker 13 (36:38):
And like you said, if you don't get it that day,
sometimes it's going to be gone.
Speaker 2 (36:41):
Because it may be like you've got a hundred of them. Yeah,
it may not be a lot of them, and they
just proof they're gone.
Speaker 13 (36:46):
One hundred percent. Or sometimes it's a thousand and it's
the same same way.
Speaker 2 (36:49):
It could be a thousand and and you are offering
really good prices. I mean sometimes it's like I can't
believe you know, it's you got to buy this thing, man,
And so people are forwarding these emails to everybody. Look
at this, Look at this, look at this. It happens
all the time.
Speaker 13 (37:06):
Yeah, and again we want our mission not only to
apply to our products, but our our industry friends products
as well, as long as they're fine with it. So
most people know that, so they come to us when
they really want to move things.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
So what's the future for the company. Are you buying
other companies, gun companies or how are you going to
expand how do you grow?
Speaker 13 (37:24):
Well, we're doing a lot to grow, you know, just
on our home turf in Columbia, South Carolina. We're looking
at different buildings. We're still we're looking to get back
into AMMO production. If you don't know, we actually were
in AMMO production. And now with powder's getting tight, our
mission again is to provide quality, affordable ammos. So when
powder prices started going up, we didn't want to start
raising the prices of our AMMO. We wanted to still
(37:45):
be able to offer that at the price. So we
paused for a little bit. But we set up primer
production a couple of years ago.
Speaker 6 (37:51):
Wait.
Speaker 2 (37:51):
Wait, wait, you're making primers.
Speaker 12 (37:52):
Making our own primers in Columbia, South Carolina.
Speaker 2 (37:55):
Oh yes, wow, yeah, that's a big deal man.
Speaker 12 (37:58):
Yeah, that took a long time.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
Yeah that is. That's a lot harder than having a
powder company.
Speaker 13 (38:03):
Actually, yes, yes, So we're getting more powder in now.
So we're going to keep expanding on that AMO side.
We're going to keep expanding on that AMMO side.
Speaker 5 (38:11):
And then.
Speaker 12 (38:13):
Yeah, and then, as.
Speaker 13 (38:14):
You said, strategically acquiring companies that make sense for us.
All our whole thing is vertical integration, right, so if
there's a stick point for us, we'll acquire.
Speaker 12 (38:23):
That's when we'll start looking at different companies.
Speaker 2 (38:26):
Yeah sounds good. I sure appreciate your time.
Speaker 5 (38:29):
Justin you.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
You've explained it very well. And uh you know, it's
like hold of Cow. There's a whole lot more to
pal Meta State Army than I realized. So all right, well,
a good show for you.
Speaker 13 (38:41):
Yeah, it's been a great show. It's always I love
the public shows. We get to interact with the customer
directly and just learn your customers.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
Man, Yeah, they really are. All right, we'll get out
there and do it. We're almost over, but I appreciate
your time. All right, thank you, stay Army dot com.
Speaker 12 (38:55):
Or how yes or Palmata State Armory dot com.
Speaker 6 (38:57):
There you go, all right, all right, you take care,
Thanks so much.
Speaker 2 (39:01):
All right, don't go far. We are at the root
of booth at the NRA's annual meeting.
Speaker 3 (39:06):
Here.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
I'm Tom Gresham and this is gun talk. I'm having
so much fun here. I'm looking out the door of
this meeting room where I am, and there is a
father and a daughter and she looks like she's about
(39:26):
seven or eight, and she is handling some of these
little rifles out here at the NRA's annual meetings. Here
on the floor, it's a big exhibit hall and you
got a lot of the major manufacturers here with their
guns and a lot of families, I mean just a
lot of families. And it is the most polite place,
the most cordial place. I have several times told people said, look,
(39:49):
you could look across the room and find somebody point
at him. Just walk over there, people you never saw
before in your life, never met him, and just walk
up and say, hey, what do you see in this
interesting and you would be in for a twenty minute conversation,
just kindred spirits, shared values, one culture. And it doesn't
(40:10):
matter if they're male or female, younger, old, black, white,
purple pokedat. It just doesn't matter. Nobody cares. It is
maybe the least judgmental group I've ever been around. It's
very interesting. I mean, I do love the makeup around here.
So the other thing you find and yeah, you can
(40:31):
go to all these big boosts and see all the
cool big guns, but they are also a little bit tables.
Like somebody rents one table, small booth, and it's one
guy or one gal who's been working on something for
years in a garage or in a spare bedroom and
finally got it to a point where they could start
(40:53):
selling it. And they come here and they're showing it off.
I talked to a guy who was making portable shooting benches,
and it's three legged portable benches and screw the legs
in the bottom. And of this what looks like it's
a three inch thick tabletop. Man, thing looks like it
was weigh hundred pounds, nice and stable, real sturdy. But
(41:15):
the siren said, looks heavy. Come try to pick it up.
And you walk over and pick it up. There's nothing
to it. It's super light. It's hollow, stable but sturdy.
He said, yeah, I said, I worked on this for years.
I said, well, why why'd you do this? He said, well,
I kept looking at all the portable shooting benches and
I didn't like any of them. And I thought, well,
(41:36):
I could do better than that. Man, I love that spirit.
I can do better than that. I think I can
do that. I mean, it's it's the Bill Gates Microsoft thing.
It's every great inventor of all time. I can do that.
I can do better than that. I got an idea,
and you get to go around and talk to everybody
and see this cool stuff. And I mean, you never know,
maybe some little widget somebody brings out and then the
(41:59):
next year, you see it on one of the guns
from a major manufacturer. Because they're cruising around, they're looking
at what's out here too. It's part of the fun here.
Now you cannot buy guns here, although you can, as
we learned last week the gallery guns folks from Davidson's.
They have a booth and you could find a gun
you liked at exhibit here from a manufacturer, go over
(42:21):
there and order it and think it would get shipped
to your firearm store, your dealer in your area, and
then in a few days you go pick it up.
So that's new. That's a new thing it's been doing here.
But it's not a gun show in the form like
you can buy guns here. So actually all the guns
that are on the floor here are deactivated. Whether it's
(42:43):
whether the firing pin has been removed or shortened or whatever,
but somehow they've all been made inert and they cannot work,
which is a good thing. You got a lot of
people handling guns. But it's a cool thing. And let's
see the next year we're going to be in Atlanta
and I would just throw it out.
Speaker 6 (43:00):
You want to think about going.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
It's great fun. A lot of people, not only come
from just the local area, but they come from all
over the country. They make it a point and once
they come, they keep coming back. They go year after
year to the NRARA show. You get to see all
the cool stuff and you see a lot of the people.
You go, oh, I remember Joe, I met him over there,
and then make friends. You go hunting with him, you
go shooting with them. So anyway, you might consider doing
(43:23):
that and next year doing that going over to the
NRA show in Atlantam. All right, quick break here. When
we come back, we're going to have some news actually
this time from gun Talk itself. Some of the things
that we are doing. Something brand new, and frankly, I
think it's pretty huge. I think you want to want
to hear that. All right, don't go far. Gun Talk
(43:43):
over you. Right back from the NRARA Show.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The MeatEater Podcast
Building on the belief that a deeper understanding of the natural world enriches all of our lives, host Steven Rinella brings an in-depth and relevant look at all outdoor topics including hunting, fishing, nature, conservation, and wild foods. Filled with humor, irreverence, and things that will surprise the hell out of you, each episode welcomes a diverse group of guests who add their own expertise to the vast world of the outdoors. Part of The MeatEater Podcast Network.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by Audiochuck Media Company.