Daily News Journal article

Sounds like Ronnie Barrett wants to retire?

Or Chris ran The Outpost into the ground. Either is plausible, though I don't know where EW is getting the $$ for the buy. His stores are never busy when I go by, he brings the same guns to every gun show where they have a table....


And then there's the whole "EW employee putting his hand on his pistol while telling a fellow Arfcommer to leave the store, while guy is holding his little girl" event.

I have not darkened the door of Outpost since about 2010  or 11 when I had enough of their crappy, arrogant customer service. When Rick Lee left the GM spot there it went to hell.

How I remember the story.

Guys goes into EW with daughter looking for handguns. Guy asks EW customer to look at guns and is told that he can only look at one gun at a time. Guy asks why, and EW employee responds by placing his hand on his sidearm and asking the guy to leave.

Going with this. Not the sharpest knife in the drawer. He likes to talk how he "invents"  all this stuff there at Barrett. Nothing could be further from the truth. And the worst weapons handler ever. No telling how many times I saw him walk through the shop with a loaded Uzi, bolt to the rear and finger on the trigger. Bebopping through the shop on his way out to the attached range. When I would ask him about it, he would look at his trigger finger , shrug his shoulders and keep walking.

He would constantly have friends in during lunch to go out on the range to shoot one of the select fire 6.8's. I would find the fully loaded rifle on my work table with no one around.

He's been wanting to for a long time. At least since before I left there in late '04

I guess finding a suitable heir to pass the company off to is what slowed his retirement. Between Chris and "The Queen of the Run-On Sentence" whom was in charge of the sales literature, it wasn't going to be an easy choice.

Yeah, I travel from Clarksville to Chattanooga all the time.    I've popped in twice and that was enough.   From arrogant salespeople to overhearing the comment of "all you need to do is rack this shotgun, it is the scariest sound on the planet"....I was done as well.

Edit:  quote was from the salesman.

I just bust a gut laughing. That was awesome.

The only person suitable to take over would be Chris V.

Meh.

Anyone with a brain and a few days to wait can get stuff much cheaper online.

I know from a source in the banking industry that EW was looking to raise capital a while back, wonder if it was for this.

I'd probably check out a "going out of business" sale. Not much else would draw me in after what I've heard about EW.

Geeeezzz, you remember what their brochures were like.

Yes. I remember what the brochures were like.

I worked at a place where the owner's son claimed to have done everything, and developed everything, himself.  

First time it really sank in how bad it was, was a couple years after I started working there, and he was standing less than 10 feet away from me, telling a newly hired employee of his accomplishments, and he claimed to have done something that I did.  The guy didn't care how many people around him knew he was full of shit, as long as he could impress somebody with his BS.

One of the old timers in the shop, said he always got a kick out of watching the reaction when a new shop manager would finally figure out what they were dealing with.  I eventually understood his fascination with watching for that, when I was bent over, hands on my knees, laughing my ass off at the shocked face and WTF? rant of a new manager that couldn't understand how the owner's son could damage a customer's property bad enough to delay delivery for at least a day (when the customer was already there to pick it up), then walk away as if he had done nothing wrong.

Where on earth is EW getting the money?  Outpost isn't a small shop.  Does it come with the building, or do they lease?

Ronnie owns the building.  He bought it back around '02 or so. It was still a gas station and snack bar then

 
Is he selling his failing business and collecting rent from the new guy?  That's a smart move...

Don't know. Haven't had dealings with them in a long time. I avoid them. I stay in contact with one or two friends that still work at the manufacturing side. They don't even go to the Outpost. They say it's too expensive.

Damn. I was hoping to swing by there and pick up a couple of M107s after I got my ticket punched in Nashville. Oh well.

EW salesman (or woman) once told me it was illegal for me to have a privately owned rifle shipped in to them for transfer.


I have never been back.