Hear That? No?
The quiet “boom” in suppressor sales
By Brian McCombie
In 2016, when the state of Iowa legalized the possession, use, and sale of suppressors, Brice McCunn was ready. The owner/operator of McCunn Specialty Firearms, in Massena, Iowa, McCunn knew he could (and would) sell a good number of suppressors. His customers had asked him about suppressors since he opened in 2012, and he had applied for and received the necessary certifications to transfer National Firearms Act (NFA) items such as suppressors.
McCunn Specialty Firearms encompasses several thousand square feet of retail space, a six-lane indoor shooting range, and a classroom. Located about halfway between Des Moines and Omaha, Nebraska, the establishment draws in people from several surrounding counties to purchase firearms and accessories as well as to use the range.
“Initially, we jumped into the suppressor market carrying SilencerCo units exclusively,” says McCunn. “Today we still offer SilencerCo, but have added some nine additional brands of suppressors to our store. The majority of our guests are using suppressors for hunting. Also, some buy a suppressor for home defense guns, which makes sense if you think about it. We do get the occasional recreational shooter who is looking to make a more desirable shooting experience for themselves.”
McCunn Specialty Firearms is only one of the many FFLs whose bottom line has been made better and stronger through suppressors sales. Could offering suppressors do the same for your business?
Considerations
As an NFA item, suppressor sales and transfers require additional federal requirements and paperwork beyond the operations of a standard FFL. As with any new addition to a store’s inventory, staff education and the marketing of a new product line will come into play. No doubt some patience will be required, too, while a new line takes hold with the customer base.
Of course, any established FFL will have to evaluate the local suppressor market landscape and decide if selling these products is right for them. Yet, suppressors have become extremely popular over the last several years, a popularity which shows no signs of dissipating any time soon.
Information provided by the American Suppressor Association (ASA) revealed just under 800,000 suppressors registered with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) in February 2016. That grew to 2.66 million suppressors by May 2021. At the close of 2023, ATF documented 3.6 million suppressors owned by Americans.
“I'd estimate that we are probably above 4 million registered suppressors at this point,” says Owen Miller, ASA’s vice president.
Retailers that once handled a handful of suppressor customers a month are now making dozens of these sales. Another new suppressor maker seems to enter the market every month or two; at the same time, many established manufacturers are backordered.
Silencer Central not only sells suppressors, but its CEO Brandon Maddox has worked tirelessly to make the process of purchasing a suppressor easier and faster.
One Company’s Expansion
Brandon Maddox is the founder and CEO of Silencer Central, one of the country’s largest sellers of suppressors. Dedicated solely to Class 3 firearms in the form of silencers, Silencer Central was launched nearly 20 years ago with the goal of providing a more simplified process for safely and legally obtaining a suppressor. Today, a Silencer Central customer can fill out the needed paperwork online, including a free NFA Gun Trust. With satellite locations in the 42 silencer-legal states, Silencer Central can actually deliver an ATF-approved silencer directly to a customer’s door.
Silencer Central offers a wide range of suppressors from top manufacturers, plus its own Banish line. The only real problem for Maddox and his employees? They are running out of room! From its facilities in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Silencer Central was handling approximately 100,000 suppressors sales a year, plus threading over 5,000 barrels to make the firearms suppressor-ready. But the Silencer Central infrastructure simply can’t handle the ever-increasing demand, which is why Maddox is currently expanding his warehouse and other operations to allow the company to sell 200,000 suppressors annually.
Maddox credits a booming market for suppressors to a number of factors, including a greater understanding among hunters and recreational shooters of the hearing and safety benefits to using suppressed firearms. He noted that many gun makers now design their rifles and handguns with threaded barrels for suppressors; in the case of handguns, many manufacturers offer suppressor-height sights.
Speedier Approvals
In 2022, Mike S. (he requested SHOT Business not publish his last name), a farmer and hunter from Michigan, decided it was time. He traveled to his local NFA dealer and completed the needed paperwork for his first two suppressors, both made by AB Suppressor of New Century, Kansas. He then waited for application approval. And waited. For eight months.
He purchased suppressor number three in December 2023. Wait time for that approval: three months. And, early in 2024 he filled out the forms for his fourth suppressor, this one AB’s Little Bird rimfire model. His approval came through in just 11 days.
A fluke? Not so, says Maddox.
“Recent changes in approval times have also increased demand significantly,” says Maddox. “We are seeing 4.8 days for many approvals as an individual submission these days.”
It wasn’t long ago that the suppressor approval process took anywhere from six to 12 months. And six months was super-fast. According to Maddox, who recently spent time with ATF leadership concerning various issues, ATF greatly streamlined the administrative process for the required Form 4 and is committed to much faster turn-around times. With the long waits generally over, that news flashed across the shooting sports landscape, encouraging many gun owners to make the move to suppressor ownership.
McCunn Specialty Firearms has invested in a fingerprint scanner with software that helps customers complete the required forms in house.
Past Hurdles
In the early 1990s H&H Shooting Sports of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, began offering suppressors. The biggest hurdle to selling suppressors then, notes Miles Hall, former co-owner of H&H, were the often painfully long wait times. The fact that a potential buyer had to (and still must) pay the $200 stamp tax up front wasn’t a help, either. The additional paperwork was new and took time to learn, he adds, and there were only a handful of suppressor makers from which to choose.
“Later the state of Oklahoma allowed suppressors on hunting guns for special circumstances, which was fantastic,” Hall says. “You could just feel this was going to be something big in the coming years.”
H&H was sold several years ago; today Hall is senior advisor with the consulting firm Hall-N-Hall, LLC, where he helps FFL clients around the nation improve their operations and boost sales. As such, he regularly advises those clients to enter the suppressor market.
Admittedly, he says, suppressor sales and transfers encompass a more complex set of rules, “but those are easily overcome with training and the right spirit.” The extra work, Hall believes, is more than worth it to the retailer making the suppressor commitment.
Do The Right Thing
Hall stresses that a retail operation offering suppressors needs to have salespeople truly educated in the use of and the benefits of suppressed firearms. “Never assume your team ‘knows’ suppressors,” he says. “Nothing is worse than a team member who clearly does not know a product area and tries to baffle with BS. The guest will see right through that ignorance or, worse, that arrogance, possibly losing that guest, not only to the store but to the shooting sports family as a whole.”
McCunn agrees on the need for hands-on knowledge. “We have several employees that have multiple suppressors of their own with real-world experience,” McCunn says. “When you can talk with the guest about caliber options, materials, and other features that have worked for you, it really helps customers to make a purchase decision.”
With his six-lane indoor range, McCunn has found that letting interested customers actually fire suppressed firearms will generate many sales, too.
“Demos are a fantastic way to help sell suppressors,” McCunn says. “It is still great to see the giant smile a guest has the very first time they get to shoot a suppressed firearm.”
SHOT Business Editor Slaton L. White recently took this Montana mule deer with a rifle equipped with a suppressor.
On Hand
Make sure you have the right cans on hand, too, suggests Ethan Buckley, sales executive for AB Suppressors. “Suppressors are an accessory,” Buckley says. “Obviously, some cans are designed for handguns, some are designed for hunting, some are designed for the tactical market. Whichever niche your target market is, even seasonally, you should carry cans for that market.”
Given the extra paperwork and wait times, he added, having the models in store helps customers make decisions now. If you have a range or easy access to one, there’s no better way to sell a particular suppressor than to let a customer use a firearm with that same suppressor.
The Trust Issue
Let’s admit it: many gun owners are very leery of the ATF and are put off by the additional paperwork needed to purchase a suppressor. Form 4 includes submitting fingerprints and having local law enforcement signing off on the suppressor purchase, both of which can add to a potential buyer’s apprehension.
To ease these concerns, the smart retailer does the things needed to gain a customer’s trust.
“Consumers must trust their dealer,” says Maddox. “Creating trust is so important. Trust that the dealer does the paperwork correctly and trust that the dealer protects the customer's highly sensitive information. Dealers need to read the NFA Handbook and have a thorough understanding of the compliance requirements of selling and the consumer possessing the suppressor.”
Being able to offer a customer the help needed to complete an NFA Gun Trust is a plus, too. With such a trust, the consumer can share their NFA items with family.
Manufacturers like AB Suppressors help dealers build that trust through staff education.
“AB Suppressor has teamed up with H&G Outdoors to help set up our dealers for success,” says Buckley. “They are our ‘boots on the ground,’ and H&G and our own staffers provide sales staff training.”
Anything a retailer can do to streamline the application process will create customer confidence in that establishment, too.
“Initially, it was difficult to navigate the NFA regulations, and it was quite the learning experience,” McCunn admits. “But going on nine years and many sales later we have the process streamlined and efficient. A few years ago, we invested in a fingerprint scanner with software, and we now help the guest complete the forms in house, from start to finish. The fingerprint scanner turned out to be one of the best purchases we’ve ever made, and we regularly hear how easy it was to purchase suppressors at our store.”
Retailers that once handled a handful of suppressor customers a month are now making dozens of these sales. Another new suppressor maker seems to enter the market every month.
Becoming an NFA Dealer
Suppressors are regulated under the National Firearms Act (NFA) of 1934. To deal in NFA items, an individual or business entity must first possess a Federal Firearms License and a Federal Employer Identification Number (FEIN). Once they have those two items, qualifying to sell NFA firearms and suppressors is a relatively simple process, according to Harry L. McCabe, an Industry Compliance Consultant with the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF).
“You simply file ATF Form 5630.7, Special Tax Registration and Return, National Firearms Act, and pay the tax (it is a tax and not a fee) for the type of business in which you intend to engage,” McCabe says. “The tax ranges from $500 a year for your basic FFL dealer to $1,000 a year for manufacturers and importers. The NFA tax year runs from July 1 through June 30, and the tax is not prorated.”
The NFA-qualified FFL then orders NFA firearms/suppressors from a manufacturer or distributor just as they would for conventional firearms.
“To make a sale of an NFA firearm to an unlicensed person (or a trust), the FFL must file an ATF Form 4 with ATF and wait for it to be approved,” McCabe says. “The Form 4 requires detailed information about the buyer, the seller, and the firearm; a $200 transfer tax must be paid with the form when it is filed.”
With the Form 4 approved, a tax stamp is issued to the retailer. At that point, the retailer and customer complete the transaction as they would with any other firearm, including the customer filing out an ATF Form 4473 and the customer receiving the stamp.
“The FFL must keep all the same records for NFA firearms as he/she does for other firearms,” McCabe says. “In addition, there are NFA-specific forms that must be retained. We have detailed record keeping and filing recommendations for FFLs who engage in the sale of NFA firearms that we usually provide to them when we do an NSSF site visit at their store.”
The Many Benefits of Suppression
Despite Hollywood’s fantasy, suppressors do not silence firearms to the point that all one hears is “pfft-pfft.” However, a quality suppressor will do the following:
- Reduce muzzle blast below the 140 decibels (dB) identified as causing harm to our hearing, with a reduction usually in the 20 dB to 30 dB range.
- Allow shooters and hunters to better communicate with each other.
- Aid the hunter, as suppressed firearms are less likely to scare off wildlife.
- Reduce recoil, up to 25 percent in some cases.
- Help shooting ranges dealing with noise complaints to improve relations with neighbors.
Suppressors can also bring new people into the shooting sports, as the reduced noise and recoil make the shooting experience much more enjoyable.