Remington circling the drain

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I heard that Remington was unable to make payroll recently. They also have stiffed suppliers with over 90 days of unpaid invoices.
This news brings me no pleasure. Hopefully they will get to reform and get out of the clutches of the hedge fund that owns them. Their quality control has been poor recently and that led to a spiral of decreasing sales and decreasing quality to shore up their bottom line.

CDNN has Remington's newly-released RP9 at blowout prices. $249 after rebate. This gun was supposed to sell for around $500.
https://www.cdnnsports.com/remington-rp9-9mm.html
Try to think of CDNN as the Big Lots of gun stores. Not good news for Remington at all.
 
RP9:

Run of the mill double stack polymer frame ho hum, ugly gun. The reviews have been mixed. For $500? No way. $249? maybe.
 
Record level gun sales the last several years, correct? No one making/selling guns or ammo should be in financial distress now. Maybe in a year or two there will be trouble for some, because if you study sales charts...after every peak, there is a valley.
 
They're owned by one of those holdings groups right? Cerebus or Freedom Group or something?

Aka the groups that exist to squeeze the last bits of any company they acquire before selling it off to the next poor sap.
 
Originally Posted By: Reddy45
They're owned by one of those holdings groups right? Cerebus or Freedom Group or something? A.k.a. the groups that exist to squeeze the last bits of any company they acquire before selling it off to the next poor sap.


Pretty much. Reminds me of Danny Devito's "Other people's money"
 
Originally Posted By: wemay
RP9:

Run of the mill double stack polymer frame ho hum, ugly gun. The reviews have been mixed. For $500? No way. $249? maybe.



For $249 maybe, worst case scenario, you can always keep your papers from blowing off the desk when that brick fails and Remington is no longer around to fix it.
 
Originally Posted By: ammolab
Record level gun sales the last several years, correct? No one making/selling guns or ammo should be in financial distress now. Maybe in a year or two there will be trouble for some, because if you study sales charts...after every peak, there is a valley.


Not if hedge funds suck all the money out in the fat years, and leave nothing in the lean. A HF's CEO isn't there to better the company to create value on the company. Their fiduciary responsibility is to the hedge fund shareholders, who don't necessarily care at all about the business unit itself.

Your point is valid though. Its a cycle.

Its a shame because I did want a remington 700, but haven't been impressed with their recent offerings. I also had a few Marlin guns I was interested in but have bought other options instead.
 
This is what happens when you answer to the stock holder, and not the customer. You're forced to squeeze maximum return in the short-term with no care to the long term.

Milk it till it drops, and then dump it off on the next poor sap that wants to actually revive it.
 
Remington had it's woes before the hedge fund took over. They are the GM of the firearm industry... huge, storied name and horribly mismanaged for decades.

My guess... it will be declared insolvent and the designs, product lines and Remington name will be sold off piece meal. It wouldn't be a bad purchase for a foreign arms manufacturer to gain a foothold in our domestic manufacturing.
 
My info is pretty recent, but came from who was presumably an insider.
In any case, I hope for three things:
1) It's not as bad as it sounds,
2) Remington regains a reputation for quality,
3) Gun craftsmen get to keep their livelihoods.
 
Remington like Marlin had the quality control suffer TERRIBLY under the Freedom Group. From the R51 being an unmitigated disaster, to so so performance from the rest of its handgun line (even the R1911 has had issues like shipping with the wrong caliber extractors installed), to the erosion of shotgun sales due to quality slipping in the case of the 870 to cheaper imports killing sales with the Remington semi autos.


Remington can and should do better than this.
 
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Doesn't surprise me to hear this. Their parent company appears to care more about profits -vs- quality and innovation anymore. Even their venerable 870 shotgun isn't worth the money anymore in my opinion. Across the board - there's nothing they make that I'd care to have. The Remington brand is just a name at this point unfortunately.
 
Originally Posted By: SF0059
Remington had it's woes before the hedge fund took over. They are the GM of the firearm industry... huge, storied name and horribly mismanaged for decades.......


This ^^^^^^^^^^

Remington would have been gone much sooner if Cerberus Capital Management had not bought them out. Plagued by debt, law suits, mismanagement, and financial baggage that existed long before they came along. Not to mention machinery that needed to be replaced over 4 decades ago. The place has been falling apart for eons. Add in the whole Walker Trigger fiasco, and the tens of millions they've had to pay out in legal settlements over the last several years, and none of this is, or should be a surprise. And to frost the cake and light the candles, the X-Mark Pro Trigger they "invented" to replace it, has become an even bigger financial disaster for them.

http://remingtonfirearmsclassactionsettlement.com/

"The lawsuit further claims that from May 1, 2006 to April 9, 2014, the X-Mark Pro® trigger mechanism assembly process created the potential for the application of an excess amount of bonding agent, which could cause Model 700 or Seven bolt-action rifles containing such trigger mechanisms to discharge without a trigger pull under certain limited conditions."

No, I'm afraid Remington dug their own grave long before Cerberus Capital Management, or the Freedom Group came along. They simply became a victim of their own creation. It's amazing they've lasted as long as they have.

http://www.guns.com/2016/11/21/how-will-remington-pay-for-the-trigger-settlement/

"A federal court will soon announce the price Remington Arms will pay to settle a class action suit regarding its defective trigger design, which has been blamed for more than a dozen deaths and countless injuries. The cost could be as much as $487 million — more than half of Remington’s total revenue in 2015."
 
A shame really. All of my custom rifles are built on Remington actions and it is the only brand of rifle that I have even for the non-customs. I always jerk the trigger and install a Jewell so I have never been concerned with the maladies that have always plagued Remington triggers. In some ways it sounds like Remington is the Colt "rifle and shotgun" company. Time will tell if they survive.
 
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