High Country Armory: How Alec Henkelman went from part time gunsmith to full-time business owner

About This Episode

In today’s episode of Tactical Business, host Wade Skalsky sits down with Alec Henkelman of High Country Armory.. Join Alec as he shares his journey from self-taught gunsmith to running a successful firearms business. Hear about his experiences with customer service, handling different firearms, and the importance of thinking like a gunsmith. Alec also dives into his passion for Cerakoting and how it has transformed his business. Discover his approach to helping customers find the perfect firearm and the value of building lasting relationships in the gun industry.

Insights In This Episode

• Offering low-cost services initially helped Alec gain experience, despite financial setbacks, highlighting the role of initial sacrifices in career growth.
• The structured thinking learned at the Colorado School of Trades helped Alec develop a professional mindset towards gunsmithing problems.
• Alec learned that investing in high-quality tools upfront saves money long-term, a valuable lesson for any craftsman.
• Expanding services based on customer demand, like adding a retail store, demonstrates the importance of flexibility in business.

About Tactical Business

Tactical Business is the weekly business show for the firearms industry. The podcast features in-depth interviews with the entrepreneurs, professionals and technologists who are enabling the next generation of firearms businesses to innovate and grow.

Episode Transcript

Wade: Welcome to the Tactical Business Show. I’m your host, Virginia Beach based firearms entrepreneur and copywriter Wade Skalsky. Each episode will be exploring what it takes to thrive as a business owner in the firearms industry. We’ll speak with successful firearms industry entrepreneurs about their experiences building their companies, leaders and legislators who are shaping the industry, and tech executives whose innovations will reshape the future of the Of the firearms industry. Let’s get after it. Welcome to the Tactical Business podcast. I am your host, Wade Skalsky. And today we’re going to be speaking with Alec Henkelman from High Country Armory. Alec, we got there. How are you doing today, sir?

Alec: Great, man.

Wade: Good, good. That was our third try, because apparently in the New Year, I’m unable to speak coherently about anything. But I’m excited to talk to you because you live in one of my favorite states in all of the glorious Union, and that is Colorado. But before we get to Colorado, because I know that’s not your state of origin necessarily. Why don’t we do a little background? How did you get into the firearms business, and then how did you end up in Colorado?

Alec: Well, I didn’t grow up with guns. My parents were not gun owners until I’ve given them guns as an adult. First time I shot a gun, I think I was 12 with my cousin in Alabama because he was a deer hunter. Always grew up watching something called the Military Channel. I don’t think it’s around anymore. More History Channel World War two stuff and just got me the bug where I’m in seventh grade and I’m like, I want to be a Navy Seal. And then nine over 11 happened and I was like, oh man, I really want to go now. I was only 12 then, but then I was 17. I had my parents signed me up for the Army, so they signed me in and then I shipped out. And then shooting guns in the Army was obviously awesome. Once I turned 21, I started a habit of buying anywhere from 2 to 5 guns a month with all the military money and pretty much no bills. Went to college. I tried to go to Gunsmithing school. It was a big long wait. So then I started my business administration degree and I realized I’m like, I fucking hate school. I’m like 24 years old going to school. It’s dumb. So I finished a two year associate’s, went back to the Gunsmithing idea, and that’s how I landed in Colorado, because the school I went to was out here.

Alec: Uh, Here. A couple the other ones had that two year wait, which is why I went to college. Couldn’t go back because I had to start a two year wait over. And so I ended up here at the Colorado School of Trades. Really great school. I would probably assume the same for most gunsmithing schools is you’re not going to you get out what you put in. I think you can coast through that and do minimal or whatever out of my specific class. I think I’m the only one who’s a business owner, but there’s quite a few other business owners from other classes of the school I went to. A couple of the guys from my class worked for me for a point of time in the beginning of High Country Armory. But yeah, that’s how it ended up. And the truth is, when I graduated the gunsmith school, I didn’t sit there and go, I’m going to go open my own store. That’s not what happened at all. I was the GM at a shooting range. I was trying to set up my cerakote side of the business with him. Things just didn’t really work out great. And so I ended up just putting in my two weeks, and I had already had my FFL at that point, even working for him. And once I quit and I had no job and no income and I had already graduated, I’m like, well, let’s start this gunsmith thing and cerakote shop.

Alec: And I was in the same building as an ammo manufacturer. And then they dealt in NFA stuff. So it was perfect. So I could work on machine guns and things like that. And it just had a couple things up for sale. I look back at the first picture of my store and it’s funny. It’s like two guns on the wall and three guns in a case and like five AR magazines. And it just turned into what it is today. I didn’t really imagine being a retail store or retail shop owner and all that stuff, but it’s snowballed into that and I feel very fortunate. There’s been quite a bit of effort that’s gone into that, and I think just the approach that I take of selling firearms, being welcoming. Despite that, I might look typical in the industry. I take a pretty soft approach with the new people. Before we recorded, we briefly talked about how a lot of my customers in Denver are Democrats or liberals or really whatever you want to call them. They’re not the typical gun person. A lot of new people, just because with the uptick in crime, they’re coming in and they’re like, man, I gotta protect myself. So I think my good customer service helped snowball that.

Wade: That’s a great story. There’s a lot to unpack there. What was your job in the Army, if you don’t mind me asking?

Alec: I was in the 82nd airborne, 11 Bravo in a recon unit. Nice.

Wade: So you got to shoot guns, right? It wasn’t just like on your qualifying time. That was part of your job.

Alec: With my infatuation of the military as a young kid, all I liked was the combat side of it. But I was just a child. I did get one deployment. We did one combat tour. We had rumors of going back and almost going back, and it never really happened. We were supposed to jump into Libya. That got nixed. And so I got the one deployment in 2009, in Baghdad. And then that was pretty much it. But I had a great time in Baghdad. Believe it or not.

Wade: Well, there was a lot going on in Baghdad in 2009.

Alec: Yeah. It was. Yeah, it was fun.

Wade: So and I’ve never been in the service, I’ve never served. So I always love hearing that. Not everyone in the gun industry comes from the service, but those that do, they do have a really interesting and interesting transformation from that going into from the service onto the business side. And I love that you went into Gunsmithing because I’m a very pro gunsmith. This is a very pro gunsmith show, because I don’t think a lot of people realize that gunsmiths are dying out. There’s going to be a huge need for gunsmiths over the next ten, 15 years, because it’s almost like accountants, right? Like CPAs, like there’s this giant baby boomer generation who all own 19 elevens and know how to fix 19 elevens. But all those people are dying out. And so talk a little bit about that in terms of what you’ve learned from when you started Gunsmithing school to the supply and the demand and how it’s helping your business.

Alec: I think I skipped so much of my journey as far as how I got to the store. So when I was the GM, I was also the gunsmith at that store. So I did all the gunsmithing and they had a range. I don’t have a range. I’d love to have a range, but because when you have a range and people are shooting and their guns not working, they come up and talk to the gunsmith. So there’s your opportunity to just give them a good deep clean or fix their part, or sell training if it ends up being user error, which honestly, 20 to 30% of the time it really is. But I met my wife, was a personal trainer. She was training this older guy. Great man. He’s still around and he liked me quite a bit. And he took me out to a machine gun shoot with my wife. And then we met this other older guy who always fixed all of our friend Gordon’s machine guns. So Gordon had all these. He had a 1919 on a Jeep that he drives around town. He’s like one of those old guys. And so I meet this old guy who’s no longer with us. He’s passed away. But Lorne had a whole kind of building in his backyard. And he had millions of dollars worth of machine guns. Two, four nines, two 40s. 1919 he had grenade launchers. He had, like, little scorpions. All these like crazy shoots. The p7’s like all kinds of. I’m like, what the heck? And he’s like this 75 year old man.

Alec: And then he has this cool gunsmith store. So I worked with him. He didn’t pay me. I didn’t pay him. He just enjoyed the company and talking. And then I’d show up and we would gunsmith and he would show me, like, his tricks, his trades. And I just use his mills and stuff. And that’s what. Just not saying anything bad about my gunsmith school. You learn quite a bit, but, like, there’s only so much you can do. And then I started getting jobs from the gunsmith, jobs from where I worked. And they required all this machining. And I had the opportunity to go work at an off site location and then fulfill the customer’s needs and learn. So that’s what got me into probably being a decent gunsmith. And sad truth, I don’t even really gunsmith that much anymore. I have my own full time gunsmith and he’s actually really great. So we source out a lot of heavy machining and stuff, but I’m just the main cerakote guy. That’s the one thing that I always fell in love with is just the design aspect of taking a black gun or an old rusted gun and turning it into something you see on Call of Duty that’s tricked out camo gun. So that’s my main specialty. I still do some gunsmithing. I think the main thing that got me into Gunsmithing is in the Army. I’m working on all my guns. I’m trying to. I was a kitchen gunsmith, sitting there in my barracks room, trying to pull a muzzle brake off my AK.

Wade: And I think one thing that’s important is that there’s so many different options for retail gun stores. If you’re going to start a business in the firearms, there’s a lot of competition, right? But I think one way that in the beginning of your of your job or your business or whatever in the industry is gunsmithing is a way that you can immediately set yourself apart, I believe, and you’re on the ground. Maybe you can tell me if I’m wrong or not. But there’s a huge demand for gunsmithing out there, and there’s a huge lack of supply. There’s not enough people learning the trade of gunsmithing to meet the need because it’s an older profession. Do you find that’s true?

Alec: It is true. It’s also when people talk to me like younger guys are like, I want to be a gunsmith or even myself going to gunsmith school. When I showed up, I’m like, okay, I’m going to learn how to be a gunsmith. Nobody can really teach anybody how to be a gunsmith. It’s all experience based and it’s trial and error in a lot of cases. Of course, there’s some things where it’s like you’re 92 and broke or something broke off the hand. You’re like, okay, you just have to replace a hammer. Yeah, that’s pretty straightforward. But in some cases you’re guessing what’s wrong with this gun. You’re trying a whole bunch of things. There’s no, like, exact science to gunsmithing. And that’s why working with some of these old guys, they’ve seen the same problem on the same gun, and they know exactly how to fix it. So it really comes down to this experience based thing, which is why those older guys are so valuable. I feel like just because they’ve seen it before and they’ve like, remember the one time they had that same problem?

Wade: Yeah, it’s like, well, it’s like when I went to law school, I don’t practice very much anymore, but it just gives you a baseline knowledge. It says, okay, so this is the baseline knowledge. Here’s how we can teach you to figure out the problem. But you’re not going to be able to figure out these problems until you go into the field and actually experience these things. Right. And you don’t become a really good lawyer until you have the experience. And you can go under someone who’s but that’s the only way you learn really anything. But it is a great entry point into the profession.

Alec: I set up a bench in my apartment even before I was the gunsmith at the shooting range I worked at, and just took jobs from people and I was breaking shit. I’m sorry. I’m like, yeah, and you typically when you’re on your own like that and you don’t have a license and you’re doing this stuff and you’re working on neighbors stuff and friends. You typically charge cheaper, like, okay, I’ll do that for 20 bucks. And then I end up breaking an $80 part. So now and then I’m paying out of my pocket to fix it and still just charge the 20. Just so it was really just getting myself that experience. And the one thing that Gunsmithing schools can do is they can teach you like how to think like a gunsmith, which is something I feel like I took away from the Colorado School of Trades. That’s exactly what they would tell me. They’re like, we’re trying to teach you like how to think. I need to think when you approach a problem firearm, how you’re going to fix that.

Wade: Yeah. But it’s an entry point. And like you said, and I really like your story about how your retail shop had like five guns and a few magazines in it, right. Like you could start that way. You don’t have to start with all this risk and investing $1 million into inventory, like you can start and you can bootstrap it from there. Walk me through the first few months or years for what is the first phase of your store? How did that go and how did you grow? And maybe it was your approach to customer service, but what were the keys to growing from when you were starting with that small store to where you were now?

Alec: Well, so I had experience with dealing with people from being the GM, managing problems, being a gunsmith, managing those problems, managing unhappy customers, things like that, from working at the range that I worked at. So I got good customer service experience there. That and I’m just I think I’m just a nice guy. Like, I just understand that this is your gun. You want to carry it every day, and you don’t love to leave it for a week and be without it. And then if I freaking scratch it, fixing it. Yeah, that’s a problem. You’ve got to approach that and handle it and that or just being nice, right. And like, forget even making a mistake. But when the new guy comes in and they’re asking some dumb questions, I had some employees that are like, what a fucking idiot. I’m like, don’t fucking say that. I’m like, we need all the people in this industry that we can. Let’s bring these people up. Let’s teach them. Like, where were you your first day shooting that fucking stupid? So just because you’ve got four years experience on them, that doesn’t make him an idiot. Like, let’s be nice. I don’t want to be. Like I said, I know what I look like, but I don’t want to be the grumpy guy. And I can’t tell you how many times when people have walked into my store and I sit there and talk to them for 15 to maybe 45 minutes, and then they don’t even spend any money, but then they’re like, wow, I’ll definitely come back.

Alec: And then they do come back because I took the time to show them all this stuff, explain all the laws, explain how this industry works because so many people are skewed and they don’t understand. But back to the beginning. I just started out as a service store, so I had about 1000ft². I had my paint booth, I had a decent savings account, so I just bought all the best equipment that I even still have today. And well, I’ll say this, a couple equipment things were replaced because if sometimes if you go cheap, you’re just going to spend more money in the long run and it’ll break and then you’re buying the better one anyway. So that’s something I learned. I had customers already walking through the door because I was in there with the ammo manufacturer. So I got into the building because of the older gunsmith, Lorne, who I was working with. Got to know those guys. They’re called Denver Bullets. Actually, they’re still around. They’re in Colorado Springs. They all have new owners now. The owner who got me in the building, he’s passed away.

Alec: But yeah, I sat there. I would order from some of the wholesalers, like some guns and things. When you first get your FFL and you can like order guns and they show straight up to your business, it’s like this exciting. Like I open up a box and there’s four Glocks. I’m like, Holy crap, this is awesome. So I’d start customizing. So I did all the gunsmithing. If people walked in, if they wanted to buy something, I’d stand and talk. I’d tell them my services. I just started out like trying to sell the services. I thought that was where it was going to go. But then as customers kept coming in and if people liked me, if they liked my personality, they liked how helpful I was, they would come back and shop there. And regardless if I had it in the store or not, they’d be like, hey man, I like you. I want to support you. Can you order this? So I would just order things until I finally had some level of capital to where I could put it into the inventory. Then I hit a point where I had so much gunsmithing work, I had to start hiring a couple friends from the Gunsmithing school and the range to just help take the gun apart and put it back together.

Alec: I still did most of the main gunsmithing. Until then I had expanded. I bought another room in the building which was the store, and it was like 300ft², maybe pretty small, but like I probably had 20 to 40 handguns, maybe not 40, I can’t remember, but it’s like I would jam pack two display cases in there full of handguns and slatwall with rifles. And for as small as it was, I would fit as much stuff in there as I could. So you could build your whole AR. I’d build it for you. Still do that? To this day we install and build things for free. So that was just this slow grow and this not so great building. But again, I was very fortunate and lucky that I met Lorne, who liked me, who introduced me to his friends who owned Denver Bullets and then also owned the building. The great thing was, is we weren’t competing businesses like, yeah, they did some transfers, but they didn’t have they had like three handguns for sale too. They quite literally manufactured ammo, sold NFA stuff suppressors and machine guns. The old owner of Denver Bullets, that guy used to buy pallets of like Mac ten full auto for like 35 bucks a piece. Crazy. Yeah. This is, what, four years ago? Probably.

Wade: Yeah. Back in the day.

Alec: Yeah. But, like, that’s who that guy was. Like, there’s these pictures. He’s like, double shooting m60s with a cigar. He’s just. He was just that guy. Like, that’s just. That’s what he did. He loved machine guns and all that stuff. So they had a really cool store. And it was all mostly old timer guys that worked there. Besides the the new owner. Now who? Eddie, who’s a 20 year marine and everything. Great guy. Everyone. I love those guys at Denver Bullets. So they’re all really good people. So I expanded into another room, and then I expanded into one more room. And then that was basically maxed out for the building. And then I was just ready to move on and get like a full retail store, just because those sales had picked up. The Cerakote and Gunsmithing never slowed down from when I expanded into my first room. I think that’s when I called one of my good friends who I was in my gun smithing class to be my full time gunsmith. So again, it’s not that I don’t. I love Gunsmithing, but I have. I know what I’m good at with Gunsmithing and I just stick to that. I can build Ares well, which is really not that hard. I can work on 1911 and handguns were always my specialty. I absolutely fucking hate shotguns. I can’t stand.

Wade: Oh, take it back. Take it back.

Alec: For some reason, most of the guns I. Gunsmith, I would say a good 30% are shotguns. I just don’t. And I don’t understand why there are pain and pain in my butt.

Wade: I don’t know if it’s my favorite gun, but it’s like in my top two. I have a mossberg tactical shotgun and I just love that thing. I just, I love it, it’s just the stock. It’s even just stock right out of the it’s nothing is I’ve had nothing done to it. It’s just I just have iron sights. I just shoot for whatever reason. And people that routinely listen to the podcast are probably sick of me saying it, but I’m very accurate with that gun. For whatever reason. I don’t know why. I don’t know what it is. Maybe it’s because I got a shotgun when I was 12, and I know I was been shooting shotguns for a long time, but that specific shotgun, for whatever reason, I can hit anything with that gun.

Alec: That has a lot to do with what you think about guns. The first gun you buy or gifted imprints your prints and almost, I don’t want to say skews, because I don’t know if that’s the best word, but it imprints in it. It molds your opinion of firearms. I wholeheartedly believe that. And I see that because my first handgun I bought was a Glock. So you could. I’m definitely a Glock guy I like.

Wade: Me to my Glock. My my EDC is a Glock 19 Gen. Three.

Alec: So that’s a thing, you know? But I do like the the 200 series of cigs. 2292 20 226. Not a big 320 fan, but I do have A226 that I absolutely love as well. But like those are my two guns, a Glock and like the metal sigs, the hammer.

Wade: Well, and I think that’s because and I believe this and maybe I don’t own a gun store, but I’m in the firearms industry. I write for the firearms industry, I have the show, I talk to a lot of different people, but I believe that there’s no perfect gun for anyone. Like everyone has a gun that fits them. It fits their temperament, it fits their body type, it fits their hand size, it fits their hand-eye coordination. And I believe that you have to. Part of the beauty of having a brick and mortar store like yours, and not just online stuff, is that you can go to someone who can help you find what that gun is for you. And when you discover that gun, it’s a big deal.

Alec: I’ll say this I consider myself to be an excellent salesman for a firearm, and one of the things that I tell these new people, it’s so easy to go Hellas or wherever or some of these other stores, and they’re just like, you want the Glock 19, you want the Glock 17. It’s super easy to do that, right? And in a lot of cases, the gun sell themselves because there’s so many great manufacturers out there. But if someone comes in and they hold the Glock and they’re like, I don’t like the grip angle, I can’t change the grip angle unless you pay me more money to cut your Glock and do all this stuff with the jigs that I do that with. So, okay, I get it. My job is to find you the best gun. If you come in and you’re you or just whoever, and you want an EDC and I sell you a Glock 20, you’re never going to carry that. I have just done you a disservice by selling a gun that’s been sitting at my store for six months that I’m dying to get rid of. And so now you’re never going to carry the Glock 20. So what I want to do is sell you the gun. That is, you’re more willing to carry every day, whether that’s a LCP that’s 200 and like a smaller sail. That’s honestly not the best gun in the world, but you carry it every day. Like, I’d rather sell that to the single mother that comes in, if that’s what’s going to protect her. Same thing like budget. I always ask people, how much do you want to spend? If they’re like, oh, I can spend a thousand bucks. I’m like, then you’re perfect. You can buy any gun. Basically, in the case, with the exception of a couple that are maybe 12 or 1300 bucks, and I’ll show you those if you’re willing to extend your budget. Right. But it’s like if you have that 6 to $800 range, you’re golden on, you have all the choices in the world. Well, yeah, because your.

Wade: Goal should be to make people safer. And if they’re not going to carry their gun, then that’s making them less safe. Right.

Alec: And so that’s.

Wade: It’s the same for your holster and even like your holster position. So I try to do appendix carry for the longest time. And I was like I just don’t like it. Like like for whatever reason I just don’t I don’t have any of the good excuses. I’m not I don’t have a belly. I’m six, Four. 215. Like I’m not fat. Like. But I carry a strong side hip, right? Like FBI side and strong side. And I just like hearing from there. I don’t give a shit about anything else that makes sure I will carry my gun every day. If I do that.

Alec: You’ll have the operator type people that can criticize that, and in some cases they might be right, and in some cases I might even agree with them. But the fact is, if if Wade sits there and carries that, that wallet side or the straight side, it’s like as long as you train, as long as you reps in practice and know how to get it out right. I carry in a cross bag my Glock 19 because I also do not love to appendix carry. I have appendix carry. When I was in the Army, one of the first few handguns I had bought, the first one was Glock 19, but I saw this $500 Springfield 1911. I was like, dude, 500 bucks. I’ll buy that right now. Bought it. Loaded chamber on hammer, back on safe. I stuck it in my belt right at the wallet, and I would walk around and conceal that 1911 not even a holster. Which isn’t smart, by the way.

Wade: With the trigger exposed, you wouldn’t have anything covering. The trigger.

Alec: Was exposed inside of my pants.

Wade: But it’s not like.

Alec: The safety was on.

Wade: Right? I guess it does have an external see, I forget it has an external safety because that’s better. At least because.

Alec: That’s. That’s young Alec, right? That’s a whole different ball game. That’s 22 year old Alec. Now I’m 35, so I’ve changed quite a bit.

Wade: And after you’ve been out of the Army, your risk tolerance starts to come back a little bit.

Alec: Right as you’re I can’t shoot myself in the ass cheek. It’s not.

Wade: Well. And you’re not like your environment. You’re not desensitized to your to risk in your environment anymore because you’re not surrounded by risk at all, every moment like you were when you were deployed. That’s a great story though. And the reason why I love that story is because just like a business, just like a person’s journey with firearms can evolve, right? And they can go to a different gun, they can go a different style of carry. A firearms business can evolve too, right? So like you started Gunsmithing and then you evolved out of the gunsmith and you still do it right, but you got to kind of niche into what you wanted to do for the gun. So I think outsource everything else. And then you just evolved into kind of what you have now, right? Talk me through your cerakote business because I don’t know a lot about that. I actually learned about Cerakote through this podcast for the first time. Someone said it to me. I didn’t even know what it was. So walk me through that business. Like, how do you get in? Because I believe you have to get do you have to get certified through them to be able to do it or how does that work exactly?

Alec: You can order an air compressor and a gun and buy the product and cerakote if you want. Cerakote to advertise for you, you must be a certified applicator. So right now I think I’m the leading cerakote applicator on their website for the Denver area for my area code. And I remember telling the guys when I worked at the old gun place, I was like, I want to be the leading fabricator in the. In 90 days of having my FFL after, I’m a certified applicator and I actually made that true. So that’s awesome. Pretty proud of that. Pretty happy with that.

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Alec: That being said, one of my friends who I give a lot of work for optics cut like we do 90% of our gunsmithing. We don’t. We sub out the barrel threading and then like optics cuts and some of the laser engraving. I have a laser engraver, but I am not a nerd and I can’t figure that out. So that’s super hard. So some of the intricate stuff. I subbed that out too. Other than that, we do everything else by hand. We’ve got a drill press, we remove broken screws, all that dumb stuff. So we do all of that. But yeah. So the guy who does a lot of that, he does really great. And then there’s another guy. He’s about an hour and a half away. He’s super, super good. How would you.

Wade: Explain to me what it is though? Like, let’s say I walked into your store and I never heard of it, and I said, oh, what is that? Like, what is it? Why do I want it? How does it work? Like, how would you explain it to somebody?

Alec: So it’s a micro thin, ceramic based factory finish. It’s not a paint because I don’t paint it on. I spray it on. It gets it cured. Cerakote. C e r a as in ceramics. So it’s a ceramic based micro thin factory finish. That’s exactly what it is. It’s extremely durable. It’s extremely heat resistant. They have different series, H series, C series, Glacier series. They’re all different rated for heat, even down to the colors like a burnt bronze. C series is, I don’t know, off the top of my head, maybe 18 or 1900 degrees. So Sarah, coating a suppressor, that’s going to do pretty good. One of my employees, he threw eight series on his suppressor with one magazine of controlled pairs. It bubbled and boiled right off because that’s rated for about 6 to 800°F. So not typically the best. So you have to pick the correct series I do I’ve done car parts, motorcycle mufflers. I’ve done an entire motorcycle. I’ve done bicycles, I’ve done knives. It’s really I’m so impressed with Nick industries, who is Cerakote. I’ve been out there three times now. I always have so much fun training with those guys. If you are out there and you listen and you’re a cerakote applicator, pay him the money. They’ll take care of you. Keep training with them. They keep evolving.

Wade: Where are they located?

Alec: I think they might have more than one location, but I always go to White City, Oregon, which is their like main headquarters.

Wade: So basically what it is like. So for my EDC, right. Like I’d want to get cerakote Sarasota on my EDC because it just makes it more durable, because I’m carrying it every day. I’m taking it into my holster, putting it on my holster, running through it. Or is it just more of an aesthetic thing?

Alec: It’s both. Like if you buy a Glock, I think it’s more durable than the finish that comes on the Glock. I also think Cerakote is probably more it’s more durable than like anodizing, because when you anodize something, it’s like similar to a bluing where it’s just changing the metal, right? So if I drop it and I ding it and then that metal is going to show Cerakote is not indestructible. If I take a screwdriver and scratch the cerakote, it’s going to scratch, but it may not show that metal underneath as much. And out of a holster all the time. Yeah, you get holster. I’m not saying that it’s this indestructible coating. It’s going to have that wear, but I do see from my own experience that it holds up a lot longer than some of these factory finishes and bluing and things. Also this like hunting rifle, Colorado snow, rain. I went out, I took my savage To gem 110 went out. We had a little drizzle. Nothing crazy. Came back. Didn’t do it clean. Three days later I had surface rust on my barrel. Nothing major. You could wipe that, get that off, but it was instantly surface rust. If you cerakote your gun and then you go out and do the same thing, and you come back and you don’t clean it. Zero surface rust. It absolutely seals in that metal. And like it’s one of the best rust preventatives ever. So when people bring me rusty guns, one of the first things I say, I’m like, you shouldn’t have this problem again after I cerakote it. I mean, is it totally perfect? I’m sure it could rust, but I’ve never seen a cerakote gun actually completely rust out. I have yet to see that. So it’s an excellent rust prevention.

Wade: And then you have the benefit too is if you want, like you said, if you want to go Gucci up your gun for like Call of Duty style, you can have that and then also aesthetically do things with it as well. Oh it’s pretty sweet.

Alec: All right. So just did a multicam in the middle and then everything else is just all tan. This is just the this is bought the plastic right. Put it on Tam. But Vanguard the buttstock cerakote. And then obviously the upper and lower with that multicam.

Wade: Nice. Yeah. And that’s what I love about firearms is that you can go as deep as you. You’ll, there’s, you’ll never find the end of the rabbit hole of firearms. It’s so deep in terms of you can go. Everyone ends up precision shooting at the end. Right?

Alec: I have these two customers that I’m thinking of specifically who? I sold both of them their first firearm, and I’ve sold both of them their fourth, fifth and sixth firearm as well. And they both trained with me. They both have good jobs, so they’ve got a little bit of spending money. Which one of them came in? He bought $4,200 Daniel defense with all the Eotech combo. And we do it all for him because, you know, he always asks that because he sees my this one’s not finished. I just swapped this out. But this optic is two grand right. So they see our stuff and they’re like oh man what is that? I’m like, dude, this whole setup is like 4100 bucks. They’re like, okay, he’s like, I get paid Friday. Let’s start. Let’s talk about that type of optic and stuff for my next one. It’s funny, like to feed off what you said, like. Yeah. Like in one of the guys he. I would say he’s liberal. He came in, he bought his first gun, trained with me, liked me. He got me like steaks for Christmas. He just came in the other day. He spent a bunch of money and a really smart guy. Works with computers and just bought that first gun. Went shooting with me, and now it’s like he’s like, oh, man. He’s like, I don’t know how people don’t like guns. He’s like, whether you’re liberal or not, he’s like, this is just so much fun. He’s like one. Now. I’m a big Pat McNamara fan. I don’t know if you know who that guy is, special Forces, but he’s always like, be your own first responder. I’m so big on that because you call 911, they’re going to show up way later.

Wade: That’s the medical part of it, right? The two other things that I consider part of the firearms is the medical and the fitness. You can shoot a gun, but can you run? Can you run and shoot and can you stop a bleed? Like like those things I consider as part of of to a right. And you can go real deep on the medical like you can go.

Alec: I gotta grab my computer charger. I’m going to die real quick. Yeah.

Wade: Do your thing. That’s all right. Technical difficulties resolved. So, yeah. So we were talking about the rabbit hole and medical and and what I hear you saying when you’re talking about the guy that came in and you sold him his first gun, is that you continue to provide them that customer service so that they can grow in their they can grow on their path of firearms and they can grow with you. And one of.

Alec: The small speeches I give where it’s like, if you’re looking for it’s mostly kind of relates to like Ars, because handguns, you can walk in, you can buy a Glock, put some trijicon night sights on and be totally happy. You don’t have to do the red dot mag. Well, all that other stuff. But with Ars, it’s like when they come in, I’m like, what’s your budget? You’re like, this is my budget. It’s like, okay, but you want the optic, you want the sling, you want the light, you want everything. Do that. Now let me help you find the best Configuration for you. What you like right now you’re going to go train. You’re going to go shoot. And then with that experience, you’ll figure out if you really love that optic that you put some money into, right. My job is to sell you the the build, be one and done. Now you can come back and buy your second build or move into that handgun or just get like once like, oh, I just want a revolver. Right. And that was actually the customer I’m talking about the other day. He’s like, I’m looking for just something new, something kind of crazy fun.

Alec: I’m like, dude, look at this revolver, dude. Like, you don’t have a revolver. You have to buy this. So I sold him a Smith. 357 so yeah, it’s like, look at what needs do you have? What’s your goals with the firearm you’re buying? What type of training and shooting do you want to do? This is the type of gun you should buy. This is the configuration that I recommend you have. You have other options. You can go Acog. You can go Eotech with the magnifier for shooting fa LV like my sig optic back there. There’s a lot. Right? Then you come back in, it’s like, okay, I’ve got the 16 inch with my magnifier on it. It’s like, now maybe I want to do an 11 five star pistol or even A75 or something super small that folds up and goes into a backpack, which I actually love building those little guys. They all fold up and everything, and they were pretty popular for a while. That market seemed to die out when they did the bracing, even though the brace rule got killed. But it seemed like they not many people want the short ones as much anymore since then.

Wade: Well, and I think the other thing too is that the and I think this is why you’re seeing all the big boys move over to like, precision shooting. Like everyone’s got a sniper rifle now, right. Everyone’s there’s because the AR platform, it’s I’m not saying that the market’s saturated. It’s not. But there’s so many options and it’s been going for so long. And so now they’re trying to I think the market’s petering out a little bit on the it’s not declining necessarily. And maybe you’re seeing something different. But like there’s only so many different AR builds you can do. Yeah.

Alec: It’s not that it’s declining, but specifically the short AR pistols that like that specific. Ask where I would have those on the wall and people were like, I want what is that? I want that I’m showing right now and be like, oh my God. And they’d buy it right then. I could do one a week, um, maybe two years ago, you know, 1500 to $2500 build for. But now it’s not that I don’t. And again, I agree, it’s I don’t think that the ah market’s petered out.

Wade: It’s just well I think you might be right though because like again if you are a hardcore firearms person that the brace rule maybe isn’t applying. Right. And so you’re not worried about buying that gun. But if you’re just a regular person and you hear that rule one time and you don’t know what it is, you’re like, oh, I’m just gonna stay away from that, right? And that’s how powerful those rulings can be.

Alec: I don’t even know that it’s been gone away, that it’s like, get lost in court, etc., etc. so that might be it as well. I do believe that, but I used to get phone calls all the time just for the small like, do you have an AR pistol? Do you have an air pistol? Yeah or no. We can order one or whatever it is. And now I put an AR pistol on the wall and it sits there for like 4 or 5 or 5 months, and that’s crazy.

Wade: Well it’s trend. It’s trend. You gotta ride the wave, right? And like, right now the wave is everyone has a Gen three clone now. Like which I find fascinating. Right?

Alec: Just so the trend that I see is just micro nines.

Wade: Yeah. Well, yeah.

Alec: It’s funny when you see the manufacturers competing with each other when the new guns come out. Right. So micro nine Glock started it with the 43 ex. Mhm. Um then sig with the 365. And then they had a 12 round capacity. It seemed like they were seeing who could get the smallest with the highest capacity. Then you had the Springfield Hellcat and the Hellcat Pro at 15 and you’re like whoa 15 rounds. And then SIG came out with their macro. That’s 17 rounds with a 21 base plate. And then that macro also had the compensator. And so now I’m seeing all these guns with compensators integrated comps. Right. So yeah now with their carry comp with the integrated compensator Springfield had their Hellcat Pro with an integrated compensator. So I see it’s just fun for me to watch these huge manufacturers subtly compete with each other.

Wade: Yeah, I don’t get into the really the micro guns just because I just I’m a utilitarian person, so the Glock 19 size works perfectly for me for EDC and then the Glock 17 for my from my bedroom gun, and that’s all I do. And so now now my next thing is working on my AR and then thermal. That’s my next thing I want to do is thermal. Do you do any night vision or thermal. You mess with any of that?

Alec: Yeah I’ve got PVS 14 and.

Wade: To sell for retail.

Alec: So I’ll do it by special order. But I guess for the monetary reasons and being the business owner, I just saw a set of the binos or the two eyed ones like Splinter Cell, cool guy, God dude, they’re going to sell for seven grand and it’s like, yeah, I have I see I have customers that buy expensive 25 to $4000 bills, but I don’t know if someone’s going to walk in and just drop seven G’s on some night vision. Well, that’s.

Wade: Why I look at the thermal, though. So, like the rattler. There’s a rattler. I can’t remember who makes it, but they called the Colorado. It’s a clip on. Right. So you can have it as just like a monocle. Right. And so it’s thermal, and then you can clip it on your rifle though, and then you can look through it. And so that’s what I’m eyeing next to do because it’s, it’s better than nothing at night.

Alec: Well I think thermals are a must, especially if you’re any bit concerned about a civil war or World War three or any conflict coming to your backyard. In a lot of cases. That’s why I hate to say it. I don’t really care about foreign conflicts. I’ve already gone to Baghdad. I’ve already done my time. Don’t call me again. I feel like I already almost died for this country twice over that. So. But I do pay attention to the Ukraine conflict because that’s the big one going on. Israel and guy like that, it’s like, okay, it’s just bombing the shit out of a bunch of people, you know? That’s really all that is. And again, I just don’t really care. But you have to pay attention to Ukraine and Russia because that’s how the next war America is going to going to fight. If we get involved with one, it’s not going to be 2009 Baghdad that I was involved in. I thought I was the shit with my nods and all my stuff I had. Then it’s like, no, with this drone warfare, huge thing is the glints. The glints on the optics is actually huge. So having honeycombs and covering those is big. Thermals is huge. Just up on a drone and seeing guys down there. So you’ve got to have thermal camouflage also thermal capabilities like what you’re looking into, which I also don’t have yet. But again it’s all expensive. It’s like all the stuff we’re talking about is not well.

Wade: And the big thing is though is like, I don’t even think you need to worry about like, I don’t get too caught up in that stuff. But the thing is, like, I live in Virginia Beach, right? So, like, what if we get caught in a hurricane, power goes down, right? Like you need to be able to see at night. You know what I mean? It’s like in North Carolina, they just had the hurricane, right? They still don’t have power in a lot of those places. So you need to be able to see it at night. And that’s why that’s the next kind of the next step. Right. You don’t I would never say to someone because you got to train with that stuff too. It’s like, I would never say I’m not an expert by any. I’m just a normal dude. But yeah, so but that’s what it kind of goes back to my point about how what’s so cool about the firearms business is that you can find your way to like what you’ve done, you’re doing the cerakote, you’re doing the, the gunsmithing. And I wanted to talk more about this too, from a business perspective, is I think it was so smart that you geography always seems to be a big deal in these, um, interviews that I have, either someone geographically is in like meaning the like where they are located with competitors or for you. You were geographically located with two other businesses that got you foot traffic, but you didn’t compete with them even though your geography was one building, that one building started your business, right, because of those relationships. And so I think that is a huge thing to think about if you’re going to start a two way business.

Alec: I quite honestly feel like my secret sauce is the quality of work we do in the customer service. Yeah. And if anyone’s listening and if you’re struggling with reviews and things like that, look at how you’re talking. Look at how much time you’re taking with the guy that doesn’t know anything when he walks in. I really believe that’s what really snowballed my sales up to what it is, because every year I’ve been in business since 2018, I’ve had financial growth every year for the business.

Wade: And you started if you started in 2019, then you had to deal with all the nonsense, right? When everybody shut down and oh dude.

Alec: In 2020, that’s when I had upgraded the retail side.

Wade: And of course, the moment you signed it.

Alec: But it was good because it put me on the map. So if you didn’t know I was there when you called all the other gun stores and they had no guns and no ammo, guess what? I was in a building with an ammo manufacturer, right? So the second it hit the shelf, it was like mice coming out and rats grabbing the boxes and stuff. I had all kinds of silly questions and again, I didn’t make fun of people, but I was standing in the ammo store and this guy, he’s like, you guys don’t have nine mil. And I’m I’m because we would just go over and fuck around and hang out with each other. And he’s like the guy, Brandon. He’s like, yeah, we’re making it now. We’re looking to have maybe 7000 hit the shelf tomorrow and it’s going to be gone in a day. And then he’s like, grab the ten mil box. He’s like, it’s only one mil difference. You don’t think this would work? And I was like, yeah, I don’t think that’s going to work, man. I just wouldn’t do that.

Wade: Chief.

Alec: You know, if he can get it to fit. Dude, pulling that trigger is not going to go well.

Wade: Well, that’s something I would do, right? Not really, but I’m sure I have an equivalent like that. Something like that. When I started I’ve asked some dumb ass question or whatever, but sure. But you’re right. Like, yeah, like that guy has to learn that and it’s it’s easy. He’s right there. And you ask him, he’s like, okay. And then but that guy will come back, or you can be a jerk to that guy and then never see him again.

Alec: Yeah. So like, I would just sometimes I can I’m a good judge of people. So I’m a good judge to know if I can make an inappropriate joke or not. Right. So I like to be funny in my classes and stuff like that. And so an example is I’ll be like, hey, is anyone here left handed? And I might get the one guy that’s like, yeah, I’m left handed. And I was like, well, I’m sorry for your disability, but we’re going to work through it and get things like that. So it’s like I make funny jokes. I make people feel comfortable for things like that. But sometimes you do have to bite your tongue when they ask a really dumb question. But again, I don’t judge. I just say, no, that’s not how it works. This is you got to do this and this funny story. This is a random thought, but I sold my store out twice in 2020 where I had like almost no guns, no accessories, no ammo. I was still doing cerakote. Surprisingly, people were still spending money on Gunsmithing and Cerakote, so I had that for income. But I’m sitting there and I’m like, I have fucking nothing. It’s like I’m looking at my wall and it’s like I’ve got like maybe a mag release for an AR or something like, and then there’s no guns to buy. There was nothing. I couldn’t go to my wholesaler and buy more stuff. There was nothing there selling Glocks for 900 bucks online. I had two guns left in the store. I had a AK Draco pistol with the folding brace and the Glock 48. And I had two very obviously super liberal girls come in. They’re like into every store and nobody has guns and nobody has.

Wade: You have you have an AK and a 48 for these two things.

Alec: I have two guns left and I see two of you, and I can tell you about them and we can talk. And I have ammo for both. I was smart, I bought ammo from the ammo guys, saved ammo with every gun. So when you bought a gun, you had to buy the ammo. It was an extra sale for me, but nobody blinked because there was no ammo to buy. I said I’m saving it. I guess they could opt out because I could sell it to the next guy, but nobody opted out, is my point. So I had like 100 rounds allocated for every gun I had in the store. So that way if you walked in and it was your first gun and blah blah blah, and in every 10s the phone, do you have nine mil? Do you have nine mil? So.

Wade: So what happened? Is there some hippie crunchy lady walking around Denver with an AK with a folding stock right now?

Alec: Absolutely. Nice. So they both bought it. They’re just like, okay, I guess they both looked at each other and she’s like, which one do you want? And the one that was like kind of like, I’ll just take the handgun. I guess. I don’t need that. He’s like, all right, I’ll buy the AK. So, you know, there’s those ring the all kinds. They’re like.

Wade: Can you cerakote it with like some flowers and then maybe like a political slogan here that’s I’m not going to say.

Alec: So I’ve done that. I had a girl ask me she wanted an AR to look like a hippie van with the flower. Still shoots.

Wade: The same.

Alec: Still shoots the same. Yeah. She was very cool. She was like, that’d be pretty.

Wade: That’d be pretty bad, though, to get yeeted by by that gun, though, like, yeah, you don’t want to get killed by that gun. Yeah, that’s just embarrassing.

Alec: I consider myself pretty fortunate to have been a new business and be able to go through 2020 pretty much with no hiccups. Yeah, I literally sold every gun I had two times that year.

Wade: Well, that’s a good business lesson. Is that the ammo? Right. It’s like, how can I package these things together to make another sale, but also to give the person what they need, right. So you have this gun, you say we’re going to make sure we have enough ammo to sell with that gun. And that helps you as a business, but it helps the person who’s buying it as well. So that’s another business lesson. Like we’ve gotten a lot of different places with this podcast, but that’s sprinkled within. There are all these different business lessons, just that you may take naturally, right? That you may say, oh, I just thought to do this, but those are really smart moves. And so I can see why you’re being successful. So we’re running up against a time a little bit here. So one more question and we’re going to end on that question. And I’m going to ask how people can find you. And that is where do you see yourself going with the store and the business. And the next day 2 to 5 years, are you just going to just try to stay where you’re at? Do you have do you think you’re going to expand or you expand services? Like what are you thinking?

Alec: I moved into a new building last May. Since last May, I’ve been burglarized five times, so I think I have to move. I’ve also grew out of that place in about three months of being there. I would like to find a new place that’s big enough to house my cerakote, and have a solid amount of inventory that I could really double what I have now. That’s where Alec would probably feel content, and I feel like I could stay there for the next decade plus and do my thing, and then I can focus on expanding online sales. I plan on staying in the Denver, Colorado area if they keep fucking around with laws. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I might have to pick up and move. It really depends. But for now, I’m here. I plan on staying and I just need to. I just can’t afford $15,000 of damage every 90 days. They just keep driving cars into my store. And it’s really difficult to combat against because I’m still a smaller shop. I have left my mark and I’m proud of the footprint that I’ve left. But there’s other stores that they’ve got a lot more capital than me and things like that, So it’s been rough and just had a burglary December 20th. So I have been sleeping at the store since then because we’ve only got a sheet of plywood over the door. And even then I watched homeless people walk up and fuck with the plywood like they can get in. I didn’t even flinch. I just sit there and they can walk in if they’d like, or pry that open, and they’ll be at the business end of something. Yeah, but yeah, that’s where I’m at. Um, looking for growth, looking to make a move within 20 minutes of where we currently are looking to keep doing what I’m doing, looking to keep providing guns to people that don’t have guns or your 10th or 12th gun. Keep training people. I love training people. I think I’m a great instructor. Yeah, that’s pretty much the goal, man.

Wade: Well, and I’m assuming if someone was watching this and they wanted you to do some cerakote work, they could mail you their gun and you could mail it back to them, right?

Alec: Yes. Uh, actually, uh, don’t charge to mail it back. So you just got to pay to ship it to me. We’ll charge you the standard retail price that we charge. We can chat over the phone via email, send me pictures of what you want. If you go to the website and see something you want. Send me that picture. I guarantee I could probably get it done for you. If it’s anything super interesting, and I feel like I may not be able to do it. We’ll have that conversation. I’m not going to tell you I’ll do something and send you back. So I’m super proud of what I do. And also, High Country Armory, LLC is our ad for Instagram. I put a lot of our jobs and projects up there. Again, if you see something you like, let me know. We’ll do it. Yeah, just ship it to me. Call me. I just need to copy your ID picture and ship it out. We’ll ship it straight back with a signature required to where you live. That’s all. How do people find you?

Wade: What’s the website? Give the address for the. For the IG again. And if they want to email you, what’s the best email to email you or call you?

Alec: So email and IG are the same High Country Armory LLC at gmail. Obviously IG doesn’t have the ad gmail, but it’s High Country Armory LLC website is High Country Armory dot net, and that’s it. And you can just Google us to Google High Country Armory and you’ll find us. You’ll see my ugly face on the website.

Wade: That’s amazing. Well, you have this look, I have a co-host at about it. Once a month we’ll do a kind of current events. His name is is John. You guys have a similar look. So he’s also a really nice guy too. So. But it’s funny because this whole time I feel like I’ve been talking to John this whole time. But anyway, I met listen, Alec, it was so good to talk to you today. I’d love to have you back on the show in, like, six months and see where things are going for you and chat again.

Alec: Yeah, shoot me an email, man. We’ll do it again, I enjoyed it. I like talking about guns, so I do too.

Wade: It’s I get to muddle through it with everybody. And again, really happy that you got to come on today.

Alec: All right. Thank you so much.

Wade: You’ve been listening to the Tactical Business Show by TacticalPay.Com. Join us again next episode as we explore what it takes to be a business success in the firearms industry.