Who remembers these guys and the big booth they'd set up in the corner of Market Hall?  The had all kinds of cordura nylon cases and holsters.  I have a bunch of rifle cases of theirs and would like to grab a couple more of a certain size as they fit the AR pistols I have just great.

What happened to them?  Google is letting me down.  Or I'm letting me down with bad google-fu.

 
He got crosswise with ATF and later was caught at the Mesquite show stealing a handgun.
Killed himself in 2017.



He was a dealer for https://elitesurvival.com/

Ooof.  That's no good.  I don't remember that at all, but that timeline seems about right for when I noticed he wasn't around.  


That looks like them.   Pricey on their site, but I already found discounted prices on Amazon.  Thanks.

I thought you were talking about the original Shooting Systems from Fenton, Missouri

Wow I was just thinking about that same Shooting Systems shop in Missouri due to this thread.

I grew up in Saint Louis and used to go to Shooting Systems with my dad as a kid  and drool over all the cool guns on the display case walls there.  I remember my dad buying an AR15 (20" Colt AR15A2 Sporter) probably circa 1991 give or take.  I also had a couple of shooting systems branded duffel bags as a kid from there as well.

What ever happened to that place?

I either did not know, or had forgotten, you were from Saint Louis

I, too, grew up right down the road in Missouri, and I often stopped by Shooting Systems, Assault Systems, Eagle Industries, Ace Bag Company, etc. all over that area

Small world.   Some of those are names I have not heard in a long time.  I was there from the mid 70's to mid 90's when I moved to Texas.

My dad was an FFL and we spent a lot of time at Shooting Systems in Fenton and another more "traditional sportsmans" style shop called Frontenac Outfitters in Ladue. (that also went out of business decades ago)

I also remember going to gun shows in downtown STL at the old convention center as a kid and shooting at the Benchrest Gun Club.

No.  I think those are different folks.  This is the logo on the cases I have.  There's literally nothing other than that on them.  

ETA:  Thinking about it, the last one I bought was probably in the 1999-2000 time frame.  

Didn't Assault Systems change their name to Elite Survival? I have had a couple Assault Systems cases, for over twenty years, and they are still holding up, fine.

Scroll up.  As I understand it from what's been posted, Shooting Systems was a "dealer" for Elite.  

Found a case that has an Assault Systems tag on it earlier tonite.  I'm guessing it came from the same guy.  At least I don't remember buying any rifle cases from anyone else at Market Hall.

The logo on that case looks like the logo I remember from the bags I had from Shooting Systems out of Missouri.  While I don't have those bags anymore I do distinctly remember the two "O"s in "SHOOTING" to be little targets and the font looks like what I remember.

Could be that store in Missouri had the same name and just resold bags/cases from somebody else where the name and logo happened to match or maybe there was some relationship.

https://elitesurvival.com/pages/about-us
Elite Survival Systems is a US based company manufacturing premium quality tactical nylon equipment for military, law enforcement and the shooting enthusiast. Our products are sold primarily through our network of dealers and distributors, as well as military and law enforcement sales. We are a GSA contract holder, and products are available at gsaadvantage.gov. Products can also be purchased online through our website, and can be ordered over the phone via our print catalog.

ESS is a division of US Tactical Systems Inc., a privately held company based in Washington, Missouri. ESS products are sold under the Elite Survival Systems label, and the Assault Systems label.
Sounds like Shooting Systems/Elite Survival/Assault Systems are the same company.

That is definitely the same logo from the Shooting Systems we knew in Fenton, Missouri, back in the day

@jbntex, do you recall ever going shooting at the River Bottoms Gun Club?

or the St Louis County gun range off I-44 by the motocross park?

It looks like the Shooting System/Assault Systems company (now branded Elite Survival) are based out of Missouri based off the description from their website.   Washington MO. isn't far from Fenton MO and  they are both part of the STL metro area.

It looks like those Elite Survival nylon bag and case folks also had a "Shooting Systems" branded brick and mortar gun shop back in the 80s and 90s in Fenton MO.  which focused on self defense type of firearms vs. traditional hunting firearms.  They also initially sold their nylon Shooting Systems branded bags/cases out of the physical store, which is where I got my Shooting Systems bags 25+ years ago.    I guess at some point they closed the Fenton MO. storefront and just focused on selling the branded bags/cases via resellers and online.

The guy at the Market Hall show sounds like he was a reseller/distributor for the Shooting Systems/Assault Systems/Elite branded gear.

I don't recall ever going to either of those places but its possible as I went shooting at all different places as a kid.

The main places I remember shooting on a semi-recurring basis were Benchrest (as my dad was a member), going over to Scott Air Force Base for shotgun Skeet/Trap, and there was some old rock quarry and the bottom was filled with water somewhere out in Saint Louis County where we would go shoot (no clue where that was as I was pretty young when we went there).   My dad also had a small 15ish yard indoor range in our basement for 22s.