Author Topic: We Should Be Ticked! (Read 3569 times)

Big Blue · « **on:** February 22, 2004, 12:13:26 PM »

You know, with the way H+R/NEF treated us by closing that forum, we ought to be so mad we'd never buy another of their rifles. :twisted: The only problem is, with all the nice things we've said about them in the past, I'd feel like a hippocrit. Not to mention the fact that I still like them. So what do we do to show our anger? I did E-mail the company, and Mr. Ed Chabot. I ain't ready to head to the Rossi forum, so what else is there.
Don

Badnews Bob · « **Reply #1 on:** February 22, 2004, 01:41:09 PM »

Howdy Big blue. Ya know I just can't get mad over something like that. I like my Handi rifles so much that I'm not gonna put them down. So... I guess I just keep on doing what I like doing and not worry about it. Its there loss not our's especially with Ole GB doing such a fine job of takin care of us here. Now iffn ole GB messes up seeing as he is an individual and not a corperation.... we just might have ta shoot him. :eek: .......Just funnin ya Greybeard :wink: :wink: :wink: :grin:

JPH45 · « **Reply #2 on:** February 22, 2004, 02:13:19 PM »

I got to shoot a 243 synthetic Handi today, a friend purchased it used, gun shot like a house afire (real good :wink: ) Ejected just fine, like every Handi I have ever seen it needs a trigger job. I've never seen a Handi that a trigger job wouldn't shrink the groups by half.

I don't like HOW they handled shutting the old board down, not that they did. I doubt that I personally will ever buy a new NEF, but I wouldn't tell someone else not to. The lesson here is clear, the firearms makers are looking out for themselves and there is no reason to think that we are any thing more a potential source of money. The days of customer loyalty being rewarded by a company that recognizes and ACTS on the fact that their LOYAL customer base is the source of their corporate wellbeing are gone. We as customers stand in competition of the worship of the stockholder and the overwhelming fear of frivilous lawsuits. May corporate America get the underwhelming support of disinfranchied customers they so richly deserve.

Leftoverdj · « **Reply #3 on:** February 22, 2004, 03:26:22 PM »

I ain't upset. The H&R Board was a freebie. No point in getting fussed when someone quits giving freebies away.

Graybeard is giving us a pretty good home, as are some other sites, and life goes on.

10ga. · « **Reply #4 on:** February 22, 2004, 03:47:26 PM »

Quote from: Leftoverdj

I ain't upset. The H&R Board was a freebie. No point in getting fussed when someone quits giving freebies away.

Graybeard is giving us a pretty good home, as are some other sites, and life goes on.

My feelings exactly :wink:

handirifle · « **Reply #5 on:** February 22, 2004, 05:22:16 PM »

Hey,
As long as we let the lawyers run the country and the morons on the jury award millions for dumping hot coffee on YOUR OWN lap what can we expect. They have to survive and another lawsuit might be the end. The anti's have made it clear if they can't pass laws to shut down gun makers, they'll run them out of business with frivilous law suits.

THEY are who we should be mad at and we need to write out Senate to let them know that. Get them to vote YES on SB659 to stop it and these forums have a chance.

I don't like HOW NEF did it, and I told them that, but I understand why. With all the mods we were talking about, it's called silent approval.

Fla Brian · « **Reply #6 on:** February 22, 2004, 08:34:32 PM »

My first reaction when I realized that MT had been so abruptly shut down was to e-mail Ed Chabot, not to raise heck but just to ask why and inquire if anything might be done to restore the forums. His reply, which came in a few minutes, was that he could not talk about it. I'm sure that mine was one of the more polite responses to the shut down.

Then, I would think, as a result of the intensely angry feedback they must have gotten over there, they gave us a little time to get some info and e-mail addresses off the site. Only then did we get some sort of rationale/explanation for what had happened.

My thinking is that, if there was a legitimate reason for the shut down, why was Ed apparently afraid to discuss the matter initially? I can only believe that the explanation given was merely corporate damage control language cooked up by some lawyer(s) to attempt to stave off negative market reaction to their products.

Accordingly, my initial feelings in the matter were to simply withhold my business from Marlin/NEF in the future. However, as someone at another forum pointed out, the real victims of such action, if widespread, would be the employees of the company. Certainly, the executives will not lay themselves off if business suffers.

So, although I am rather ticked off by the actions of a bunch of suits, I think my buying decisions will have to be product oriented. If they make someting that I want/need I'm going to let that be my guide. As has been said, it isn't as if the MT closure has left us with noplace else to go. In fact, from what I've seen of this place so far, we're better served here than we were at MT. Hence, in a way, they were really doing us a favor.

Now, if they will apply some of the money they'll save by closing the forums into product development/improvement (especially with regard to that awful model 60 - and I don't mean developing another "upgraded" stock finish - the cosmetics were not what was the real problem with that thing, although improving the looks of a product, without actually improving the product itself, is a typical corporate strategy nowadays), the cloud may have another silver lining. I'm nothing if not optimistic, I guess.

Big Blue · « **Reply #7 on:** February 23, 2004, 01:49:14 AM »

In my E-mail to Ed Chabot, I was as polite as I could be, just asking what could be done, and expressing my desire to have it returned to normal. I didn't even get a reply. A few days later someone had posted an E-mail address for the company, and then I told them of my concern that their decission might affect sales, given the underhanded way they went about closing the site. If we had been given a weeks notice, it would have saved a lot of scrambling to regroup the family. I like their rifles, and those of Marlin, so I will continue to buy the ones made in the USA, but probably not with the amount of enthusiam I once had. I know I should just get over it and move on, but it still has me ticked and I guess I still have a need to express it.
Don

marv · « **Reply #8 on:** February 23, 2004, 02:13:09 AM »

You'll know the old saying every thing happens for the best!
Look what we have now, MHO it is better than what was with
H&R, Marlin sights they Had. At least I like it Better.
We all should Mr & Mrs GB a big thanks For this sight.
Then go on with our lives. Enjoy this sight.
This my 2 1/2 cents Marv :-D :-D :-D

Big Blue · « **Reply #9 on:** February 23, 2004, 02:17:52 AM »

Quote from: marv

Mr & Mrs GB a big thanks For this sight.
Marv :-D :-D :-D

Marv,
That certainly is true, I feel like they rescued us, and we owe them a great deal of thanks, along with our loyalty.
Don

Brett · « **Reply #10 on:** February 23, 2004, 02:51:26 AM »

My $.02:

1) DJ is correct - the site was a freebie. It's not like we payed any dues etc. and we are not out any money.

1a) Many of us kind of %#$@ in our own hats by crying about so many problems (real and imagined) on the forum which they did not have nor want to expend the resources on to address on the site. i.e.; paying full time monitors to address these issues on the site. In addition a few (to our credit very few) post were not what everyone would concider 'family friendly'.

2) Ed Chabot is an employee of the company and was probably ordered not to respond to any inquiries reguarding the shut down of the site. To do so could have cost him his job. Go easy on him untill you have walked in his shoes.

3) Yes, They could have given us more notice but probably did not see the impact the closing would have on us until it was done. Hind site is 20/20 as they say. When they did hear of our distress they were gracious enough to reopen the sight for a period so that we could retrieve whatever we could. They were not obligated to do this... see #1.

4) Like any other company in the free world the bottom line is that they are in business to make a profit. If the management of the company believes that something they are or are not doing is hurting those profits then they are oblidged to make changes in order to keep themselves and their employees in jobs.

5) How many other gun manufacturer can you name that have sponsored a free forum?

6) They gave us a year plus of free time to make new friends and talk about something we love. Personnally I thank them for the time and resource they had given us. Would this group be together today at GBO if it had not been for the forum that H&R gave to us for the past year +?

If you have ever owned your own business then you know that there are times when you are forced to make decisions that are not always easy nor popular in order to stay afloat and or stave off the wolves.

Brett

Big Blue · « **Reply #11 on:** February 23, 2004, 03:04:15 AM »

Brett,
Your points are all valid, but people can't help the way they feel. The company had to make an unpopular decission, and it just doesn't sit well. Am I right to feel this way? I don't know if it's a matter of right or not, just the way I feel. With time we'll get over it, and through the graciousness of our current host, we have been able to maintain our family ties.
Don

Brett · « **Reply #12 on:** February 23, 2004, 11:57:18 AM »

Quote from: Big Blue

Brett,
Your points are all valid, but people can't help the way they feel. Don

I don't think that is necessarily true Don. Not to be aguementative but we can to a great degree "help the way we feel". We can choose to dwell on something unpleasent or choose to just forget about it and move on. We can look at the negative aspects of a situation or choose to look at the positive aspects. An athletic coach will tell his team "When you get out there, remember what we did in practice !" or "Remember what we did when we kicked so-n-so's butt's a couple of weeks ago!" to make his team "feel" like winners, not "Remember how these guys kicked our butt's last time!" Keeping our attitudes in check can an does effect our feelings.

Brett

hellacatcher · « **Reply #13 on:** February 23, 2004, 12:07:08 PM »

Five years from now this will all be forgotten and have moved on to better things.

Probley less than that , maybe even last week.

bubba · « **Reply #14 on:** February 23, 2004, 01:35:24 PM »

As I see it they had no alternative but to shut it down the way they did. If they had left it open to post and gave us a day they were going to shut it down it would have just turned into a gripe session and finger pointing for blame like it was here they shut it down and begging them not to. Plus who knows what disgruntled poster might have tried to hack them so they could lose more than a free chat site. They owed us nothing. If you are that upset about them closing it, why are you here still talking about their products? Quit buying their firearms. Let us just be grateful we have another and I will say better site to talk about the same things we did there. In fact Bill responded well by setting it up almost the same as it was there. Would you prefer they raised the price if every gun by 50 bucks to pay for a monitor? Not me. As I saw it there, it turned into a lets gripe about certain posters and beg The administration to do something about them. Well they did the only thing they saw they could do at the time. Some of the load a cartridge to the top with powder and ram a bullet down on top of it type posts I mean. Some people might just take that as the way to do it. Liability makes the world go round. They are not going to hang themselves out to dry over something like that. Why do you think there are the rules here that there are? To keep the site civil and enjoyable. It just plain got out of hand over there so they put a stop to it. It turned into the BM show

Markus · « **Reply #15 on:** February 23, 2004, 02:21:31 PM »

It was my fault for talking about how I didn't like what appeared to me to be deceptive marketing related to the new Pardner pump. Using a name associated for years with an American made product. no mention of the guns true origion on the website or catalog.I'm told that if you look very carefuly with a much better monitor than mine you can just barely make out the Made in China on the receiver. I told them I was disapointed as a customer and user of H&R for 30 years. I'll buy a few more of their American made guns this year probably. I can't blame them for shuttng the old board down. If a prospective customer loked at the forums and read all of the negatives there it would turn them away. I just hate the thought of some kid or anyone for that matter,spending the money for the pardner pump thinking they were getting a USA made gun and ending up with a product produced by the Chinese military. I they put "NEW FROM CHINA" "So we could get it to you cheap" in the add I wouldn't have given it a second thought.Seriously I know that I didn't shut the sight down but my last post there and all of the replies to it would have made me shut it down if I worked in H&R management.

Wlscott · « **Reply #16 on:** February 24, 2004, 03:32:07 AM »

Quote

Five years from now this will all be forgotten and have moved on to better things. Probley less than that , maybe even last week.

Good god I hope it's less than five years. I'm ready to forget it now. I'm just happy we have Graybeards to go to now. It's better than the old H&R site anyway.

I also agree with the post above that the old site was turning into the BM show.

.308 · « **Reply #17 on:** February 24, 2004, 09:03:34 AM »

Big, I was ticked to start with, wrote them an email, politely thanking them for letting us use the site for as long as they did, and asking them to consider opening it up for a short time so we could try and contact our new friends. Musta been a bunch of us did the same cause you see/saw what happened, and I appreciate that.

But I ain't ticked no more, I like it here even better, and looks like a bunch of the old gang does too. Sides staying ticked won't bring back what we lost. :wink:

fast*eddie · « **Reply #18 on:** February 24, 2004, 11:29:06 AM »

The H&R site was a free ride and I enjoyed it most of the time . I agree with Bubba , the BM show got to be a bit much. It's easy for posters to get riled with a company for taking away a site but we are not accountable when something on that site goes wrong. I have 3 NEfs and 2 Marlins and if the need arises I will continue to purchase from them. I hope tis site turns out to be better .

MSP Ret · « **Reply #19 on:** February 24, 2004, 11:46:38 AM »

, Hello .308, It looks to me as if already have back what we lost, and better too!!!....<><.... :grin:

Big Blue · « **Reply #20 on:** February 24, 2004, 12:09:34 PM »

Guys, I do understand the need to move on, the fact that the site was a freebie, that maybe the lawyers weighed in and forced the shutdown, and even the fact that we now have a great site on which to post. I think the two things that bothers me the most are, the fact that it was done without prior notice, and the fact that, that site and our loyal postings sold more rifles than any other advertising they have ever done. I don't let it affect my life, or keep me up at night, but that just plain irks me. Loyalty is a two way street, or should be. My one consolation is that I believe they cut their own throats by closing down the biggest sales pitch they had. The guys that have claimed responsibility for the site closing, were for the most part correct in posting issues such as the new Chinese connection, or quality control issues. I am however extremely grateful for our new home. I look forward to a lot of friendship, and good info being shared, and I feel honored to share it with you guys.
Don

Pick_Kimbel · « **Reply #21 on:** February 24, 2004, 04:19:14 PM »

Quote

award millions for dumping hot coffee on YOUR OWN lap

This MacDonald's had been cited twice by its corporate checkers for serving coffee that was too hot. Measured temperature was 200 degrees. When the "want cheese with that' workers poured the coffee, they pushed the top on and handed it to the woman by the lid since it was too hot for them to hold. This 'super size it?' ijit then dropped this coffee in her lap because it was burning their finger tips and wanted to get to her as fast as they could(note who dropped what on whom). This woman got 1st & 2nd degree burns in the perineal area{I'll let you look that up since this is a 'family' board} that required skin grafts. Basically, she was seat belted into a small pot of boiling water that she couldn't get out of.

As an RN that worked with skin graft patients(I could never work in the burn unit in Parkland), I can vouch that it is not my idea of a 'minor surgery'. Yes, there have been some opportunistic leaches that copy-catted the concept, but this woman did go through some misery from this.

Pick