Quality as defined by some doesn't necessarily mean conformance to high standards of manufacture. What they are more likely referring to is upscale use of materials and how they are finished.
I read it all the time - and the examples given are almost always those of exotic woods with extremely high finish, metals with high polish that required hand work, and with hand decoration that cant be done by machine. "Quality" in that regard is all about being high end decoration and finish, not highly precise machining or how it works together to make a firearm highly reliable or accurate.
Case in point - Service rifle marksmanship. You can build a quality AR or a quality M1A - the latter will cost up the three times the money for the hand fitting and gunsmithing to make it equally as accurate. And yet in competition the AR still holds the top ten places. It frustrates some who see oiled wood stocks and nicely finished blued steel guns falling out of the running to stamped steel and plastic. It offends what they were brought up to accept as the natural tier ranking of what it takes to be superlative.
Well, superlative is a marketing term, based on commercial image making. You don't need exotic oiled wood or hand polished parts to be the best - but in the social dynamic of making your product appear better than the next, you exploit the commonly held myths that are actually created by marketing and then use them to make it appear that your product is better.
It's very much a straw man marketing campaign - and if you really want to study it in depth, do focus on Rolex. It's a $500 watch with another zero added to separate money from the buyer to elevate him into a club. Same with guns. Charge another zero on the asking price and make sure you only present it with the necessary "tells" of high class ownership, the masses will line up and some will hand over the money. They aren't buying that much better a product - a Rolex may be a certified Chronometer, but a good quartz for $200 will still be more accurate and actually have more complications. An engraved Belgian Browning shotgun may be $20,000, and fit the shooter exclusively in near perfection. I just hope he's a decent shot, tho, because it won't mean squat in a National level competition on clays.
People buying "quality" are actually buying social rank, and when we hear them bemoaning it's loss in the marketplace, what we are really hearing is that it's becoming more expensive and they can't afford it. They can't buy social standing at their income level any more - they can't buy guns with hand fitted parts and fancy oiled exotic wood stocks for the prices they used to pay.
Ok, you want exotic wood and hand fitted parts, add another zero. The mass makers can still accommodate them, it's called the Custom Shop and they are quite busy with backlogs. THOSE guns aren't often seen in the racks at BoxMart, the market hasn't really changed, what did change was what it took to stay in the rack of consumer priced guns. You can't get good wood or highly polished steel at that price level any more. You can't buy social rank from department store gun racks - and in the good ol days, you couldn't then, either. What some revere as the good ol days in firearms didn't exist - they couldn't buy the high end guns back then. They bought the cheaper ones that only shared a few features.
I don't remember seeing Weatherby's in the gun rack at OTASCO. I did see some nice looking Remigntons and Winchesters. They weren't in the same class back then, and what some call out as the distinguishing features of a "quality" gun aren't really that. They are what made owning one gun a higher social ranking. Be careful what you call "quality" because it is still an indicator of what is really wanted. Modern guns are much better made than we give them recognition, 1MOA is now common, when it was then superlative.
You can miss an appointment just as easily wearing a Rolex or quartz Seiko, the only difference is how important you think you are doing it. You can miss a clay just as easily with an engraved Belgian or pump Mossberg, how good you think you look doing it is in your own self image.
Are you buying a well made gun, or a gun that makes you look well?
