A representative from a safe importer called last week wanting to set up an appointment to show off a variety of safes that are mounted in a “traveling showroom”. He is signing up dealers to sell their Chinese and Korean built products. I stated very directly that in the last four contacts with his company, at SHOT Shows and in phone calls, their company’s reps misrepresented or flagrantly lied about the products they were selling. He stated that if that had happened, it certainly had been some kind of simple misunderstanding. Anyway, he said, it can’t hurt to just look at their safes and judge the quality.
So yesterday the rep visited our shop with the cube truck sporting an assortment of their products. He was excitedly explaining that their Chinese built gun safes were far superior to everyone else’s Chinese built gun safes because “These lines of gun safes have bodies made of 10 gauge and 8 gauge steel” rather than 12 and 14 gauge steel like the others. On opening the door to the first safe and feeling the steel I immediately told him that the steel was not 10 gauge, that they had again lied, or at least stupidly misrepresented their product. He was offended and called the home office for reassurance. But I measured the steel with a micrometer and proved to the rep that his gun safes were, in fact, 12 gauge steel, just like everyone else’s cheap Chinese gun safes. He went on to make a number of other false statements before leaving.
The problem is that this company is going around signing up dealers who apparently do not question what they are told. These dealers then sell inferior products to consumers who are told that they are paying for better protection. When you plan to buy a quality gun safe, ask the seller enough questions that you can be certain he is knowledgeable and honest. And do not trust any safe which was built in China.