Leadership in the Industry
A friend recently expressed concern about the lack of business acumen within the firearms industry. I can’t say that I disagree simply because there’s a lot of guys in the industry just like me. Small family business guys with a dream of making a living out of their passion…with little or no actual business experience. I'd like to start out by saying that the following is completely my personal opinions on the matter having witnessed it for many years in many shops. It is not a reflection on any shop in particular.
Now you’re asking yourself what exactly I mean about that…as your adrenaline levels rise. I get it but hear me out. The firearms industry is full of gun guys (of one level or another). Very few, if any, have real business experience much less business degrees. No, for the most part they just love range time and think it will get them by in the business world because they know their clientele. Does this mean that they shouldn’t be business owners? Far from it.
I’ve worked for my share of shops, both big box and mom and pop. There’s a reason the big box guys not only stay in business but add new stores every year. It’s because they’re run by a network of intelligent business majors and accountants. How do they get by without firearm knowledge? They hire gun guys for $8-$10 per hour to sell guns. Why so little…if they’re the only ones that know their products? Because that’s all they’re worth according to the bottom line. This is just one of the things that spurs them to start their own business.
But let’s leave those guys out of the conversation. They already have it worked out. Let’s concentrate on the little guys by covering a couple key problems.
One thing a small shop can have going for it is a good accountant. Such was the case at my favorite small shop. I was the gunsmith/shop manager there. They kept afloat because the accountant didn’t let them do too many stupid things. It was a great shop to work for. Everyone got paid on time, the checks never bounced, and everyone took an active role in planning and brainstorming for the business. When the accountant sold his share of the business and left….the shop became a much different place. Pay checks were late and often bounced. The brainstorming became placing blame on the employees for not giving the owner ideas to save his business. Employees doing anything other than the bare minimum and talking behind ownership’s back. The shop quickly died an agonizing death. The point here is that often times the money is mismanaged in the smaller shops. It’s not that they are being purposely wasteful it’s just that they aren’t trained to handle a higher volume than the family checkbook. That’s not a way for me to place blame it’s simply a call to educate yourself or hire someone to handle the day to day finances…someone with actual training.
One rarity in the industry is true leadership. Let me point out that there are vast differences between a manager and a leader. A manager is a task master. He gives you a schedule that he expects strict adherance to. He gives you tasks and makes sure you complete them. A leader, when not taking care of his mountian of paperwork, is behind the gun counter, he's filling shelves, he's setting an example to be followed. The big box guys take what they get because they hire the best managers that find them. So they get by with what they have only because they have leaders managing the managers. In one of the national chains I worked for they had a vegan cyclist in charge of the gun/hunting/fishing department. He had been a department assistant manager before but never in hunting. He was good for little more than making the schedule and spent most of his time as far away from the department as possible.
In another big box I had a manager from the 10th Mountian Division. A sargant highly trained in leadership. It didnt' take him long to become the rarely seen, kissing up to the boss manager that was equally as useless as his fellow managers. The department only functioned because of a great assistant manager, with no militay background, that did all of his work for him. My only reason for pointing out the distinction between the two is that it's not enough to simply make what seems like a good hire. Upper management has to stay informed on how their managers are doing. If they aren't doing their job, or simply doing it poorly, and a store's General Manager or owner doesn't know it they THEY as well are not doing thier jobs.
When it comes to the mom and pop gun stores poor leadership is like a cancer eating away at what could be a really great shop. You get plenty of “here’s your check but don’t cash it until Monday,” or “here’s half your check. I’ll have the rest by next week”. High quality employees won’t put up with that very long. Those that do, do so only because they feel other work will take too long to find. But at the end of the day they have families to take care of and family comes first. An unsteady $8-$10 per hour is enough to chase anyone away. You mess with a man’s ability to pay the bills or put food on his table and you’ll lose a great sales or service employee.
Now you may also be thinking that I promised two key points and both of these have to do with money. Money rules the business. You need it to make it and yet if you don’t have enough money the business dies. Well, having someone to manage money and someone to lead employees to make you more money are both key principles. More importantly than having people both of these people is having people highly qualified for these positions.
The firearms industry needs a leadership revolution. Will you be a businessman that leads the fight?
