Category: Finance

Product Consolidation

Corporate Fuckery, Finance, The Gun Thing

…as Ruger might call it, or as others (like myself) might call it: “heritage destruction”.

Ruger officials confirmed industry chatter this week that it would immediately stop producing four models, while it will halt production of several others at the end of the year. 

Production of four revolver lines – some going back to 1958 – would be suspended, effective immediately: 

    • LCR
    • SP101
    • GP100
    • Bearcat

On Tuesday, the company announced changes to several current-generation product families as part of its ongoing Ruger 2030 strategy.

“These decisions reflect our review of consumer demand, evolving market preferences, manufacturing complexity and the long-term profitability of each product family,” Abbey Clary, Ruger’s director of media, advertising and public relations, told Guns.com in an email. “The goal is to focus our resources on the products consumers want most today while creating capacity for future product development and manufacturing modernization.”

I leave it to y’all to decide what Clary really means with the above corporate wafflespeak, but a decent summary might be:  “If you ain’t gonna buy ’em, we ain’t gonna make ’em”.

Fair enough.  Revolvers, and the people who love shooting them, are clearly a dying market (literally, in the latter case).

But the good news doesn’t end there, oh no.

A larger group of products are nearing suspension, with their final planned production runs through the remainder of 2026. They include:

    • SR1911
    • LC Carbine
    • PC Charger
    • PC Carbine
    • LC Charger
    • Redhawk
    • Super Redhawk
    • Blackhawk
    • Super Blackhawk
    • Single-Series (Six- and Nine) revolvers
    • Vaquero
    • Ruger No. 1
    • 77-Series rifles
    • Hawkeye
    • Ruger Precision Rifle

…leaving one to ask, as the article does, well what the fuck is left?

Rifles:

  • Mini-14 rifle
  • Ruger 10/22
  • Ruger American Rifle
  • Harrier series AR-15s

Pistols:

  • LCP Security 380 and Security 9
  • RXM
  • MAX-9
  • Ruger 57
  • 22 Charger
  • Mark IV

How nice of them to leave us with at least the 10/22 and Mark IV.

Ruger are quitting the 1911 market (probably because their offerings sucked green donkey dicks, so no great loss there), and ditto the “precision” rifle market (because people who do precision rifle shooting generally go for higher-quality platforms like Bergara, Howa and Sako, while for the budget-conscious, there’s always Savage).

Oh, and the relaunch of the excellent Red Label shotguns is irrelevant, because Ruger’s outsourcing the production thereof to Connecticut Shotgun Manufacturing (CSMC) so it’s just a label on someone else’s gun.  I suppose we should be glad that they’re using an American gunmaker instead of some backyard Turkish suppliers.

As a one-time corporate marketing puke myself, I can understand why Ruger is doing this.

As a lifelong gun enthusiast — and a lifelong Ruger buyer — I’m feeling nothing but gloom and despair.

It makes all sorts of sense, financially speaking;  but the joy of shooting Ruger’s incomparable revolvers has just left the building, after kicking people like me in the mouth.

I’m not sure I’ll ever buy a Ruger product again.

What Price Collecting?

Finance, Morons & Idiots

Lots of educational video to watch today, because… it’s the weekend!

One of the reasons why wealthy people are looking at hypercars as fungible assets and investment vehicles [sic] is because they are wealthy enough to ride the ups and downs of consumer demand — why, for example, a rusted-out 1950s-era Porsche 911 or 1960s E-type Jag can ask for, and get, a premium price for that piece of junk.  Scarcity, of course, helps — which is why a rusted old 1956 Porsche 356 cabriolet will always be worth more than a worn-out 1975 Honda Civic:  the first is worth restoring, the second is only worth recycling.

If you’re interested in learning about this business — even or especially if you can’t afford to play in it — then I would suggest you watch Cars & Money, Rob Moore’s excellent podcast channel with his partner, Carl Hartley of Tom Hartley Motors.  Here’s one example.  (All the podcast episodes are long, about twenty minutes too long in my opinion, but they’re peculiarly fascinating.  This particular episode, you can quit at 1:28.00)

And speaking of watching, there’s the premium watch business, where Teddy Baldassarre, for example, plies his business.  (Here’s one.)

But in this latter category, if you want to see all the costs of creating a watch collection — as an investment strategy — then please take a look at this one, (yeah, it’s A.I., but it’s factually correct) to find out how the big watch brands are bending collectors over the table:


(…and these guys are the worst, which is why I’ll never own a Rolex, because I’m not going to play their stupid game.)

Oh, and by the way:  the actual purchase price of these items is only the first lightning-strike on the wallet.  Then comes the (mandatory) servicing, the parts replacement, etc. etc. etc…. see how the insurance companies play ducks and drakes with your premiums.

Oh, and by the way, car manufacturers like Ferrari are equally guilty of the same kind of practices (which you’ll also learn from Cars & Money;  watch out for the word “allocation”).

 


…and Porsche is just as bad.

If a fool and his money are soon parted, then the duration of “soon” is shrinking faster than a cheap Chinese cotton T-shirt in the clothes dryer.

And when baubles like watches and performance sports cars start becoming investment assets, the Finance Fucks in companies like Rolex are going to start making marketing decisions (pro tip:  they already are).

It’s the utter cynicism of the whole business which gets up my nose.  My only consolation is that the fools who’re being thus led around by the nose are the super-wealthy who can afford to pay those bullshit prices.  And I have absolutely no sympathy for them.