Episode Details

Dustin from Cole-TAC joins John and Kaylee on State of the Second to talk through a question the firearms industry keeps circling: does "Made in America" still matter when imported goods are cheaper and faster to get? Dustin started the company with his wife in their spare bedroom in New Hampshire in 2015, almost by accident. He bought a suppressor cover, destroyed it the first day out, and his wife, a sewing wizard, told him she could have made something so much better for less. His buddies at the shop where he worked, Ruger, saw the one he made and wanted their own, and a side hobby turned into a company. Nine years later Cole-TAC runs out of South Dakota with 29 employees and hundreds of products for civilians, law enforcement, and military.

The heart of the episode is what it actually takes to make sewn goods in the United States. Dustin is blunt that sewing here is close to a dead industry. Almost everyone he hires arrives with little or no sewing experience, so the company trains from zero and works to turn its sewers into craftsmen. He explains how products get born from real use in the field, like the Rifle Guardian rain cover that came out of a soaked long range match in North Carolina, and the Brain Bucket bag built for a SWAT team in Georgia. He walks through why most customer requests do not become products, how design time is expensive, and how the company automated its custom suppressor cover process so a website order feeds patterns straight to a CNC cutter and down to the sewers with a custom touch at production scale.

The conversation also covers COVID, when Cole-TAC designed and made over 60,000 hospital gowns in a couple of months after supply chains from Asia shut off, and the lesson that the country still leans on overseas labor that is significantly cheaper. Kaylee and Dustin press the point that buying American carries weight. It supports a local community, and it keeps money from going overseas to fund people who do not like us. They talk about suppressors and the NFA, government overreach in states like Colorado, the military's Barry Amendment, the pull of instant gratification, lifetime warranties, and the appeal of long range and rimfire shooting. Every Cole-TAC product ships with the sewer's name signed on it, the connection Dustin wants customers to feel.

Links

• www.cole-tac.com

Questions this episode answers

How did Cole-TAC get started, and why did the company move from New Hampshire to South Dakota?

Dustin and his wife started Cole-TAC in their spare bedroom in New Hampshire in 2015 after he destroyed a store-bought suppressor cover and his wife sewed a better one. The operation later moved from New Hampshire to South Dakota, a relocation that began in 2021 and took almost two years.

Why does Dustin say sewing is close to a dead industry in the United States, and how does Cole-TAC find workers?

Dustin calls domestic sewing a nearly dead trade because almost everyone Cole-TAC hires arrives with little or no sewing experience. The company trains its people from zero and works to turn them into craftsmen.

Where do Cole-TAC's product ideas come from, and how does the company decide which customer requests to build?

Many Cole-TAC products are born from real field use, like the Rifle Guardian rain cover that came out of a soaked long range match in North Carolina and the Brain Bucket bag built for a SWAT team in Georgia. Most customer requests never become products because design time is expensive.

What happened to American manufacturing during COVID, and how did Cole-TAC respond?

When supply chains from Asia shut off, Cole-TAC designed and made over 60,000 hospital gowns in a couple of months. Dustin's takeaway is that the country still leans heavily on overseas labor that is significantly cheaper.