TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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Hi everyone. Sorry if this isn't appropriate to post - go ahead and delete if not allowed. But I read the forum policies and didn't see a conflict :)

I work in development and casting for Cineflix Productions. We’re an international TV production company that produces a variety of unscripted/documentary programming such as American Pickers on History Channel, Property Brothers on HGTV and others.

We are currently casting a new series for a major cable network about American gun shops. The series is set to follow several shops across the US to showcase a variety of gun owners/buyers and give an unbiased, objective look at gun shops in the US.

Would love to get some recommendations, or talk to someone (or some of you) who knows gun shops well and might be able to recommend shops that would be an interesting fit for our show. Would love to feature a shop with left of center owners/clientele.

Please drop a reply or shoot me an email if you are able to help. Thank you.

-Austin
asteele@cineflix.com

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

8
Interesting question. I'd guess that for drama purposes it would be ideal to find stores in radically different circumstances. Oklahoma City, Portland, Anchorage, East LA, that sort of thing. You'd probably need urban stores so there's enough traffic to give you some TV.

Unfortunately there's a whole lot of stand around a counter filling out 4473s in a mask and waiting on the NICS check to come through. Not exciting. More fun if you find shops with ranges, try-before-you-buy options.

You can send my consulting fees to ActBlue.

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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I’m questioning the premise. Depending on the approach you take, not insignificant harm could be done. When I think of the intellectual vacuum that is the majority of reality TV shows I worry about what this might be. Shows like Pawn Stars, Duck Dynasty, etc. where the producers look for extreme personalities and even purposefully gin up more drama to make it “interesting“... No thank you.

The various communities and individuals who legitimately support the Second Amendment don’t need this.

If on the other hand, producers were looking to help viewers understand the nuanced arguments for (or against) the Second Amendment, a mature look at why and how ALL American’s legitimately purchase and use firearms, correctly train, maybe even highlight shops that are owned/operated by minorities, or disenfranchised, in a positive or even neutral light, I could get behind the idea.

But I’m skeptical that’s what we’re talking about. If I’m wrong, there are excellent choices in Austin, Houston, and DFW Texas.

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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Thanks everyone for your suggestions. I have reached out to a number of them already and continue to welcome additional shop recommendations as well as ideas and input like what Damn Yankee said above. Feel free to PM me or email me and I can disclose the network and more details about the show format. But this show is a more authentic, non-biased, observational look at gun shops and their clientele. The focus here isn't big characters or drama. That show has been done over and over. The premise is a snapshot of gun shops, gun culture and the gun industry by looking at a variety of gun shops across the country and their day to day activity.

Thanks again all!
-Austin
asteele@cineflix.com

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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Another interesting aspect of gun culture that you can look into is the firearms training business. It ranges from lessons in basic marksmanship and history by Project Appleseed, to highly tactical courses in Clint Smith’s Thunder Ranch.

For a fuller picture look at competitions, from cowboy action shooting to IDPA and IPSC.

I have the impression that the historical & engineering side of gun culture tends to skew left of center, as opposed to the tactical and legal side. Talk to Forgotten Weapons, Inrange TV, and C&Rsenal channels on Youtube.
Glad that federal government is boring again.

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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If you find a good gun shop, please let me know.

This is how you will know it is a good gun shop:

This place will have a large inventory of new and used guns, military surplus and fine sporting shotguns and they will be competitively priced. It will have an ammo section that will include, in stock, .38 S&W, .32 S&W long, 16 ga. shotgun shells, and at least one box of .50 BMG. It will have staff that are both friendly and knowledgeable. (you usually get one, the other or none of the above) In the back room will be a machine shop and a grumpy old fart who could make a fine firearm out of two railroad spikes and a shipping pallet. If it has a wood burning stove and rocking chairs, it will probably be located close to the gates of heaven.

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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KlownKannon wrote: Thu Aug 13, 2020 7:55 am
rolandson wrote: Wed Aug 12, 2020 11:07 pm.

We aren't zoo attractions. Our hobby isn't curious or otherworldly.
I want to go to the range dressed as a clown. Would that count?
Exactly!

Complete editorial control...just like I said...!!! (Three exclamation points, so you know I'm all business...)

Wait...
Correct me if I'm mistaken but...weren't you dressed as a clown when we hit that place a few years back? I'm pretty sure that you bore a striking resemblance to Bozo.

Or...oh....maybe you weren't uhhhh....?

Nevermind.
Subliterate Buffooery of the right...
Literate Ignorance of the left...
We Are So Screwed

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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Hey, asteel. Yeah, there's potential troubles with respect to how liberal gun owners may be portrayed. You may be discovering that we're not quite as cookie cutter as NRA folks are, nor are we how the NRA may portray us. We are so diverse the NRA just can't understand a thing about us.

I might make a suggestion for your film crew to find individual liberal gun owners who do other stuff like build guns, reload their own bullets, cast, compete in contests, and that sort of thing. The crew could go visit these folks while practicing covid clean stuff like over zoom or google or something, and interview them and show their shops or gun rooms and so on. Any gun .org is made up of individuals. Just this small thread has more diversity that you can shake a stick at.

Best of luck with your project.

CDFingers
Crazy cat peekin' through a lace bandana
like a one-eyed Cheshire, like a diamond-eyed Jack

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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rolandson wrote: Thu Aug 13, 2020 10:13 am
KlownKannon wrote: Thu Aug 13, 2020 7:55 am
rolandson wrote: Wed Aug 12, 2020 11:07 pm.

We aren't zoo attractions. Our hobby isn't curious or otherworldly.
I want to go to the range dressed as a clown. Would that count?
Exactly!

Complete editorial control...just like I said...!!! (Three exclamation points, so you know I'm all business...)

Wait...
Correct me if I'm mistaken but...weren't you dressed as a clown when we hit that place a few years back? I'm pretty sure that you bore a striking resemblance to Bozo.

Or...oh....maybe you weren't uhhhh....?

Nevermind.

You're making fun of my big, floppy feet again, aren't you?
I don't like to think of my self as an artist so much as someone who stares at empty spaces and imagines s--t.

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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KlownKannon wrote: Thu Aug 13, 2020 11:05 am
rolandson wrote: Thu Aug 13, 2020 10:13 am
KlownKannon wrote: Thu Aug 13, 2020 7:55 am
rolandson wrote: Wed Aug 12, 2020 11:07 pm.

We aren't zoo attractions. Our hobby isn't curious or otherworldly.
I want to go to the range dressed as a clown. Would that count?
Exactly!

Complete editorial control...just like I said...!!! (Three exclamation points, so you know I'm all business...)

Wait...
Correct me if I'm mistaken but...weren't you dressed as a clown when we hit that place a few years back? I'm pretty sure that you bore a striking resemblance to Bozo.

Or...oh....maybe you weren't uhhhh....?

Nevermind.

You're making fun of my big, floppy feet again, aren't you?
Flo asked if your name was "Darryl"?

Or are you the other brother "Darryl?"

Or the Surly "Other Brother Darryl?"
To be vintage it must be older than me!
The next gun I buy will be the next to last gun I ever buy. PROMISE!
jim

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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nigel wrote: Thu Aug 13, 2020 11:39 am This is a typical LGC forum thread. The man asks about oddball 'Murrican Gun Shops an' pretty soon everybody goes on about anything but.
'Scuse me sir, can you direct me to Joshua Tree? Well, son, Yo-Semite is that-a-way.

http://www.lmcammo.com/ specialize in reloading and black powder guns.
We don't need any damn furriners critiquing the way we do things on our "Murrican forum, Nigel!
'Sorry stupid people but there are some definite disadvantages to being stupid."

-John Cleese

Re: TV Series Looking for Gun Shops

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Mason wrote: Thu Aug 13, 2020 12:10 pm
nigel wrote: Thu Aug 13, 2020 11:39 am This is a typical LGC forum thread. The man asks about oddball 'Murrican Gun Shops an' pretty soon everybody goes on about anything but.
'Scuse me sir, can you direct me to Joshua Tree? Well, son, Yo-Semite is that-a-way.

http://www.lmcammo.com/ specialize in reloading and black powder guns.
We don't need any damn furriners critiquing the way we do things on our "Murrican forum, Nigel!
:love: :love:
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