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Old October 4, 2012, 10:36 PM   #11
orionengnr
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Join Date: July 9, 2004
Posts: 5,172
The Chiappa Rhino is an interesting design, but I have no idea how labor-intensive the manufacturing and assembly are...nor do I know where the parts are manufactured or the revolvers are assembled. Yes, it is nominally an Italian company, but in our Global Economy, the pieces could be manufactured in China and assembled in Algeria.

I cannot see how Colt could either match that business model (and alienate it's Made in USA followers) or build the snakes in the US at a prohibitive manufactuiring cost.

If you look at modern S&W revolvers, you will find that many "old-timers" want nothing to do with them. If this aversion is justified or not, it really makes no difference....in the end, there is a large body of S&W owners who will not buy a new S&W.

If Colt started producing "new" snake-series revolvers and priced them starting at ~$1000, many/most old-timers would look down their noses at them, in much the same way that "new" S&Ws are viewed as a lesser product by many long-time S&W guys.

Start with bluing--trying to duplicate the bluing of the older Pythons and S&Ws is...well, perhaps "economically unfeasible" might be a good start. Not that it cannot be done, but it could probably not be done at the necessary price point.

Now, consider the fact (okay, the thesis) that there is a relatively fixed number of revolver buyers/shooters. That is a (relatively) fixed-sized pie. Add one more manufacturer into the mix, and (absent some market-changing variable) each manufacturer gets a smaller slice of said pie.

I think that Colt has done it's market research and figured out that trying to re-infiltrate what is likely a saturated revolver market would be a great way to lose a lot of money.

In contrast, they are specializing in what pays the bills (1911s and ARs).

JMHO.
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