Haters from Within

You would probably be both amazed and appalled at the stories I could share with you regarding the obstacles we face as a firearms business. Everywhere we turn, every day we do business, someone brings a fight to our doorsteps. Sometimes they have a real axe to grind about firearms and sometimes they are simply cowards. If we accepted every invitation to fight that we get, well… we simply wouldn’t get any business done.

I’ve come to accept the fights I get from people outside our industry. Many companies we try to do business with go running for their safe space the minute they hear the word firearm. One such occurrence happened just this week. This one really has me shaking my head. We contracted with AMC Theaters to advertise on their slides before the feature movie starts. We thought it would be a great way to get the word out about our company. Now, when we entered this agreement, they told us “you can’t use the word firearm.” Really? Is that before or after The Equalizer II, Mission Impossible, The First Purge, or Sicario II all showing at their theaters this weekend?

So we complied. Our ad shows our fashion, and the copy says Ranges, Training, and Boutique all with our buffalo logo that we are quite fond of. And you guessed it, someone called and complained and was “offended”. They pulled our ads and breached their contract because some executive at AMC corporate is both a coward and a hypocrite. How they could even have that conversation with us when 90% of their movies feature our product; I cannot even comprehend. Good luck with Sicario II guys.

But the fights that really puzzle me and quite frankly sadden me are the fights brought to us by fellow 2A supporters like @tacti.gal on Instagram and the subsequent attacks by her followers. Take a look at what she did to one of our posts. You’ll notice this is the millennial equivalent of spray painting the side of our building.

The interesting thing she does first is calling us out for our training and her perception of the grip the young lady in our picture is using to hold the firearm. “Don’t shop at Big Box stores but support small business that have the experts to train you.” What I love about people like this is that they never do their homework. If she did, she would know that we are a family owned store with owners that grew up right here in good ol’ Lee’s Summit, MO. Second, she clearly hasn’t explored the credentials of our trainers, whom served in the armed forces, are all former law enforcement officers, have every credential known in the firearms world and our training director is a consultant to Homeland Security.

Then she goes on to criticize the girl in the picture, calling us out for using her in our marketing of memberships, labeling her a “dumb broad” and commenting “she doesn’t have two brain cells to rub together”. Wow – judge much? This young lady happens to be a very sweet professional model that was thrilled to be used in our ads. True, she hasn’t had a lot of experience with firearms but she was very excited to learn and after the photo shoot proclaimed, “I think I would really like this sport.”

Then @tacti.gal goes on to further insult our business model by informing us that she doesn’t like our “gift shop” and has no interest in our “coolers and country apparel”. Finally she concludes with “can’t wait to see what they say” clearly trolling for a fight.

Sorry @tacti.gal, you’ll get no fight from us. But what you will get is a public shaming. I sat reading your post wondering to myself – why? In a country so divided on firearms, operating in an industry under intense pressure, with so many that want to take away our 2A Constitutional rights, shouldn’t we be supporting fellow firearms enthusiasts? Shouldn’t we be going out of our way to bring in new shooters and not shame them for their lack of expertise or experience? Shouldn’t we support all the local firearms businesses regardless of what business model they employ to further the sport?

I doubt very seriously you make a full time living in this industry as an “ambassador” for United Gun Group. Otherwise you would know how hard this business really is and the intense pressure the industry is under right now. Frontier Justice has invested well over $20 million in defense of the firearms business, right here in Kansas City. We have created jobs, supported local law enforcement, employed veterans, all while charging forward carrying the 2A flag. @tacti.gal you are part of the problem and I encourage you to take a hard look at your attitude and get behind supporting those that are right there with you in the fight for our freedoms. We have enough opposition without haters from within.

I shot in my first USPSA tournament 2 weeks ago. As a lifelong hunter, I’m much more adept with a shotgun and rifle than a pistol. Needless to say, I came in dead last in the tournament. My grip wasn’t always right, I dropped a few magazines, I forgot to chamber a round once, but I sure had fun. And you know what? All those shooters there never said one negative word. They encouraged me and said things like “It’s your first competition” or “We were all nervous and made mistakes our first time”. My favorite was “You’ll kill it next time!” Now this is the shooting community that I love and gets me to work every morning. These are the people Frontier Justice is fighting for.

Let’s not throw shade on our fellow shooters, firearms professionals or firearms retailers. We need to stick together. The fight is hard enough without fighting from within. And if you are going to get ugly, at least do your homework first. It’s a complicated sport and it is riddled with varying opinions on what methods and equipment are best. Let those in glass houses not throw stones, because @tacti.gal, I attached a picture from your feed with you shooting a rifle that has no sights on it. For the record, Frontier Justice frowns on this practice. Never in a million years would we publicly or privately criticize this practice, but instead if we had been confronted with this privately, we would have recommended sights installed by our expert gunsmiths. We would have never called you a dumb broad with a lack of brain cells. We rise by lifting others, and we would have suggested a sight and lifted you up. Let that soak in—because we are guessing you already know this. Instead of hateful vitriol out of context, let’s all band together in the continual fight for our rights as firearms owners in one of the greatest countries in the world, where we certainly also have freedom of speech.

Michael Brown

CEO