Shot Show Orlando FL

Anyone attending the Shot Show this weekend???
1/15-18/09

Would an engraver benefit form this show???
Jerry

If the show is in Orlando, and the engraver is from almost anywhere in the north, he/she almost certainly would benefit by attending. Anything to get out of this cold and snow!!!
Will

Jerry: I haven't been to one in a few years, but a Shot Show can be a great place to view engraved firearms.

The first time I went to a Shot Show was in New Orleans in 1980, and it was one of the first times I'd ever seen another engraver work. The Browning Co. had an engraver there, as well as Howard Dove engraving in the Colt booth. I also met Pedretti, and they were all kind enough to engrave a little something on a brass plate that I had with me. / ~Sam

I just spoke to my friend in FLA and he was there yesterday and met Lee Griffiths. GRS has a booth there.
Keith

I just talked to Scott this morning, maybe we will a report when he gets home...
Scott said Lee was there with GRS...
I missed seeing it was going on this weekend, darn...
Jerry

Hello Jerry, I remember going to the shot show back in 1984 I think that was the year. I was hoping to drum up some business. I met the folks from a lot of the gun companies and it was quite a thing to see. But the response when I talked to Smith and Wesson, Colt, ect. was how many engravers do you have working for you? And the other response was, we send most of our work to Ken Hurst. I soon realized this was not the place for an individual engraver looking for small jobs. But I saw some really great things and even met Fred Bear.

Good Luck

Ed

Ed, I think going to any decent sized show will be worth your while. Carry a sample of your work and or good pictures of your work & always have lots of cards. Not that you will walk away with work but, there's always a good chance you might impress someone looking for your talent who moght be in the position to hook you up with a commission. Incidently, the reason you were asked how many people you had working for you was the need for fast turn around on commission. When I had my co. , I had as many as 40 people working in the shop/house so my turn around time was rather quick on a large project. Oh yeah, the late Howard Dove was a very close friend of mine and was my first apprentist. I reccomended him to Colt where he became a Colt master working in the custom shop. After leaving Colt, he returned to Blacksburg, Va. where continued to work until he had a heart attack & died. Howard was the finest sort of fellow & was there to help anyone interested. FWIW .... Ken

I alway thought the SHOT was a very under-attended show by engravers. Part of the reason being that they always have the conflict with the SCI/Custom show (Reno this year). Even when they are in the same town there's just no way anyone could work both. That's needed to change for decades now, and I doubt it ever will.

But, if you go to the SHOT, you need to realize the differences between the exhibitors. Yes, by definition the largest companies will have the most work. But the problem for small to medium companies is very often that they have no one to turn to for custom engraving. Most are lucky to know 2-3 names they've used before.

I think you could get a fair amount of business if you'd target the small to medium sized companies who offer custom work, usually because they will have the access to metal and stock workers, but rarely an engraver. You would have to have a marketing piece, photos, prices, services all listed. But you could get work.

The IWA would be another good show to try, but there you'd want to make sure you had a table. The Germans get upset with those who work the crowd without one. Of course there you'd run into a fair number of the non-industry types who do look for that type of work.

I'm sitting here at the Orlando airport waiting on flight back to Nashville. From an engraver's veiwpoint there was not much to see. The only engraver I saw working there was Lee Griffiths at the GRS booth. He was working on knock-out plate that he plans to sell castings of. Traditonal places that have had engravers working in their booths like S &W, Merkel and Beretta did not have anyone.

Normally you don't see much over the top engraving at SHOT, or even average hand engraving. The vast majority of it is going to mass production of roll, laser or etch methods. Gotta go to Reno to see the good stuff and in quantity!

Of course, I could have missed something, my focus at SHOT is normally on target airguns and this year in particular on my new BF-17
http://www.pilkguns.com/menu_ar15.shtml
I did see Yves Halliburton at the show, maybe he can tell us if there was something great there.