Are Wal-Mart guns lower quality?

[oneounceload]

I had the staff at Gander refuse to honor the price of powder from a local Walmart as being" not the same, and of lower quality"

Really? You think St. marks powder, a subsidiary of General Dynamics, is going to make their Alliant powder to lower quality specs and incur law suits? The same goes to the major gun makers.

Unless it is a Walmart exclusive, it is the same gun, and if it is an exclusive, the only low quality might be a cheaper wood stock,or the combo sets where they add a cheap scope

Remember, guns are NOT a major item for Walmart like groceries or blue jeans or even computers

 

[hso]

If the model numbers are the same then the product is the same. That should be simple enough for anyone to understand.

OTOH, if the model number isn't the same then you have to ask why.

With knives, something I know a little about, some manufacturers will offer the same product in a cheaper packaging to differentiate products. The SKU will be different and the price will be lower in the cheaper packaging. At times a new model with cheaper materials will be produced at the behest of a Big Box retailer and that will be a unique model that has its own SKU from the manufacturer.

If you see a different model or SKU then you may be looking at a product that is different than what you'd see elsewhere, BUT if the make/model/SKU are the same the quality will be the same.

 

[rtz]

Here's one that's insidious and nefarious while we are on the subject about things being subtly different.

Get one of these knifes and take it apart. Now go buy the same knife from Home Depot and take it apart. You'll find a magnetic security tag in the handle:



At about 7:20 minutes into this video he shows it(I had one and it had it too):



And I'm nearly certain the cheap jeans walmart sells are seconds, blems, or "b rated". There is something different, screwed up, or not quite right or normal about any pair they sell.

If Amazon ever gets same day delivery going; walmart will be history. You'll be at work buying things on your phone and they will be at your house when you get home from work.

And to think at one time in the 1980's you could actually buy Glocks and other hand guns at walmart!

Then they stopped selling guns in stores. Then they started selling Colt 6920's(at a decent price) and other AR-15's for a very brief time. Now look at them! Bunch of flip flopping liberals or what?

 

[larryh1108]

Would gunmakers sell a less safe gun to a Walmart type retailer? No, the potential lawsuits would make any cut in costs not worth the risk.

However, I'm sure every company that produces products has a final QC section to check the final product. We often ask how issue abc got past QC on about every gun maker out there. My thought is that there could be 2 or 3 piles of finished products. Products that don't quite fit the eyeball part of the QC are sent to pile C, which sells to the Walmarts of the world. Things like funky grain on any wood parts like stocks or forends. Cosmetic parts that don't perfectly match against the mated part like a synthetic stock against the receiver, etc. Cosmetic flaws like uneven blueing, dimples in molded plastic and other non-essential flaws. These do occur and I'd be willing to bet these are the guns sent to places like Walmart. Why not? Someone has to get them.

 

[AlexanderA]

Big buyers ("big box" stores, chains, etc.) are in a position to specify things like degree of quality control, amount of pre-finish polish, fit of wood to metal, and so on, to meet their price point. It's well known that Italian imports from Pietta and Uberti, for example, sold at Cabela's are not as well made as the same models sold through Cimarron or Taylors. Cimarron and Taylors can afford to be picky about what they will accept from the makers because they have a higher price point to work with.

Actually, I'm not sure whether the big box stores "downgrade" or the boutique distributors "upgrade," but the end result is the same.

 

[BADUNAME30]

I don't knbow anything about the guns they sell. BUT................

We have a LGS and the owners swears, and believes, that the name brand ammo sold at WM is factory "seconds", "rejects" even and will not " fit or work" in any of the firearms that he sells.He tells his customers that only ammo that he sells will " work in the guns i sell".

That's just as absured as saying WM sells inferior guns.

 

[zorro45]

I heard the same story about the little pancake type air compressor I was considering buying at Home Depot. My local specialty tool shop told me how bad it was, how the three nail guns that came with it were pieces of junk, etc. Well, I bought it anyway, and I drain the condensed water out of it each time I use it, and 10 years down the road it is still going strong. I have bought identical Rem870 shotguns from Dicks and my LGS and they are really identical except the price was $100 less at Dicks. When my local Walmart still sold guns they had some models that I would not buy, but I think it was just that they were the lower price point models, sometimes unpopular models, etc. and now they just sell ammunition.

 

[texasgun]

"Ruger 10/22 with a polymer "canoe paddle" stock"

if you prefer to the very cheap (hollow) plastic stock the entry level Ruger 10/22s have ... that's nothing Wal-Mart specific. I looked a the 10/22 takedown both at Wal-Mart and a dealer... EXACT same gun.

I doubt Ruger runs "special" stocks for Wal-Mart 10/22s versus the 10/22s at your dealer. Seriously - the few $s they would save would be more than eaten up by additional warehousing, logistics and the overall risk that a WalMart version would end up at a normal dealer.

 

[Deaf Smith]

I once had a doctor ask me about a Browning .22 he wanted.

I told him there was one at Wal-Mart just like that and he said, "But are they any good?"

See there was a high class gun shop near by, same gun, same designation, same bluing, just well the same gun, but for a much higher price.

The problem was the gun snob thought higher prices automatically meant higher quality, even if it was the same item.

Now Wal-Mart won't carry to many Kimber rifles or guns by Churchill ,or Piotti's but they get the same Remingtons and Mossbergs as any other gun dealer.

Deaf

 

[rgwalt]

I've heard this story several times before and I don't buy it. I've seen "economy" models sold at big box stores. The Beretta A3901 comes to mind. Synthetic stock and a different gas system set this $600 gun apart from the AL391, which starts at $1000. However, if the model number is the same, then I think that you can count on the product being being the same.

The thought that a gun manufacturer would hire a person or persons to pick out "factory seconds" or lower quality firearms for sale at a lower price to Walmart, Academy, or Dicks is absurd. It doesn't make sense from an economic perspective. The reason that big box stores can undercut the LGS is their volume buying power. However, if you want a special model, then you will likely have to seek that specific, higher end model out at a LGS (or more likely on-line). Another thing you get at a LGS is more knowledgable sales staff and the ability to pick up supplies and accessories like extra magazines, holsters, etc.

The idea that an ammo manufacturer would sell lower quality ammo (defects, seconds, etc) to a big box store is even more absurd. Do you know what it would cost them to run such a sorting operation? Absurd.

 

[inkinskin]

I got a Sig Sauer M400 MOE Enhanched rifle on black friday from Walmart and it is high quality with magpul upgrades.


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[Sigokat]

Firearms makers like Marlin and Winchester used to make cheaper versions of their rifles exclusively for retailers line Sears, Western Auto, and Montgomery Ward. I don't know why it's not reasonable to think it may still happen.

 

[monotonous_iterancy]

I don't believe for a second that the ammo is different. These stories have made me a bit wary of the guns. Not because they're mechanically inferior, it's just things like machining, wood quality, such as switching from walnut to birch, finishes, stuff like that, little things.

Btw, is Wal-Mart ever going to sell ARs again?

 

[Deltaboy1984]

I have heard this for years but I Don't believe it.

 

[mcdonl]

My guess is Walmart tends to sell the lower model from each manufacturer. Only a guess though, my closest two walmarts do not sell guns b


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[dfariswheel]

1. Like Sears, Wards, Gamble's, Western Auto, and others, gun makers do make special guns just for a retailer. These may have lesser wood or some features may be different, but the basic gun is the same.

Walmart has had custom order guns made just for them but these are guns with non-standard features so Walmart can offer something no one else has.
As example there was a Sam Walden Commemorative shotgun and a Ruger 10/22 with a longer barrel and a synthetic stock.

2. No gun maker would risk their company making a substandard gun for any retailer.

3. The telling fact: Walmart stores buy their guns from the SAME distributors that the local gun store buys.
Other then the special run Walmart-only guns, Walmart does NOT buy "train loads of guns" at a special low price or lower quality.

The local Walmart sporting goods manager orders that stores guns from distributors like RSR, Eliot Brother, and Zander's, just like the local gun shop.
The Colt AR-15 you buy at Walmart is exactly the same rifle sold by your local FFL store.

 

[W L Johnson]

So let me get this straight, some people need to be told that if it has a different model number it may not be the same?

 

[Skyshot]

I purchased a Stevens model 200 .308 from Walmart because it was the cheapest price I could find at the time. The rifle doesn't know it's a cheapie because it shoots sub MOA. Go figure.

 

[Mosin T53]

The main reason we can't get ammo at our local Wal-Mart is the gun dealers buy it all up!! They hike up the price and sell it in their shops.

 

[W L Johnson]

The main reason we can't get ammo at our local Wal-Mart is the gun dealers buy it all up!! They hike up the price and sell it in their shops.

Which magically make it higher quality according to many of these same dealers.

 

[newfalguy101]

Identical as far as functionality, not so much as far as cosmetics.

Wally-barf guns ( along with other big box chain stores) are built to a pricepoint.

 

[Double_J]

Wal-mart will spec. out a price point on some things and let the manufacturer figure out how to meet that price point. That is what happened at a company I used to work for. We would get a request for bid from wal-mart and we would figure out where to cut costs to get the price point. The electronics world does this by taking a given model and using lower grade parts, 5% components instead of 2%, less shielding, less packaging, etc.

The only way I see this happening with wal-mart for guns MIGHT be if they had a special model that was exclusive to them. I do not see it with the colt ar-15, ruger rifles, winchester, mossberg, remington, etc. Those are the same as you would buy somewhere else, but they are bought in such capacity that they get a bulk discount. I would gladly buy one from wal-mart if they had one in stock.

 

[newfalguy101]

No. In fact it's ridiculous to think that S&W, SIG, Savage, Remington, and all of the other brands they sell would manufacture a separate line of guns made from cheaper materials in this sue happy world.

To meet a pricepoint on a half million ( OR MORE ) dollar order, you better believe they will!!

 

[gearhead]

Here's one that's insidious and nefarious while we are on the subject about things being subtly different.

Get one of these knifes and take it apart. Now go buy the same knife from Home Depot and take it apart. You'll find a magnetic security tag in the handle:



At about 7:20 minutes into this video he shows it(I had one and it had it too):



And I'm nearly certain the cheap jeans walmart sells are seconds, blems, or "b rated". There is something different, screwed up, or not quite right or normal about any pair they sell.

If Amazon ever gets same day delivery going; walmart will be history. You'll be at work buying things on your phone and they will be at your house when you get home from work.

And to think at one time in the 1980's you could actually buy Glocks and other hand guns at walmart!

Then they stopped selling guns in stores. Then they started selling Colt 6920's(at a decent price) and other AR-15's for a very brief time. Now look at them! Bunch of flip flopping liberals or what?

I used to work for a company that made power tools, all the big box stores started requiring us to put those magnetic tags in everything because they were suffering so much lost inventory. It was a PITA to locate it inside a power tool handle because the store insisted on the tag being reliably deactivated when the barcode on the packaging was run across the scanner/deactivator.

 

[W L Johnson]

To meet a pricepoint on a half million ( OR MORE ) dollar order, you better believe they will!!

And it would have a different model #, maybe just one number or letter but different.