I was recently asked a question by an astonished firearm writer who experienced our .223 Wylde Rifle for the first time. "How can BCA make such an accurate rifle at such a low price?"
Our vision has always been to produce high-quality, low-cost, and easy-to-use products for responsible citizens in the firearms and shooting community.
To answer this question as accurately as I can, I will need to explain a few different factors.
Skilled Employees With The Right Tools
Before our inception in 2013, the founders of Bear Creek Arsenal had 42 years’ worth of experience in running a machining company. At the time of our inception, we saw a great need in the market for a firearm manufacturer to address the need of the common man & woman in the United States.
Through our experience, we learned that providing innovative equipment and tools to our skilled employees helps give them the ownership and confidence of producing quality products. Our continual improvement in our processes has helped us become better and better at producing quality products and it is thanks to our skilled employees that we continue to learn and grow. We have capitalized on our team’s experience to reduce unnecessary costs so that we may pass these savings on to our loyal customers
Quality has always been and will remain a top priority for our company. Investing in equipment and tools is only a portion of what makes us successful. The next portion has been our time investment as Machine Operators, Engineers, Designers, and Quality Control technicians. All these roles and people have played a huge part in our growth as an organization and our continual product improvement and development. This experience has led and directed our team to implement efficient (lean) manufacturing principles, ensuring a reduced cost of our product, and reducing waste.
Equipment
Bear Creek Arsenal found itself needing to provide our quality products to a larger demand due to the huge surge created in February of 2020. We purchased an additional 151 new CNC machines to help meet the demand in the marketplace, effectively doubling our capacity and output. This has provided us the opportunity to manufacture our products on over 400 top-of-the-line CNC machines at our 435,000 square foot facility.
As the demand has decreased, Bear Creek Arsenal management had to decide on our new way forward post-pandemic. We had two choices; the first was to reduce staff and employee count, or we had to find a way to keep the machines running and our employees employed. We decided to do the latter. That meant that we had to create a solution, and that solution was to provide our products at an unheard-of price for certain rifles and upper assemblies while maintaining the same quality. We needed to keep producing high quantity and high-quality products for the everyday man & for the everyday woman.
Variety
One of the other key factors that allow BCA to continue to bring quality products at a low price is our variety. Bear Creek Arsenal builds 16 different calibers in a range of barrel lengths and types. These barrel features include fluted and unfluted, parkerized, black nitride, and 416R stainless steel. All these different variances provide us with over 200 unique different SKUs of our upper assemblies alone, helping us keep our employees working and helping keep our seasoned staff longer.
Future
Our engineers have come from top universities to ensure we are designing excellence from the ground up. They have helped create our .22 Long Rifle and our .22 Magnum upper assemblies and they have only just begun.
Our new products in the design and/or a testing stage for 2022 include:
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Bufferless systems
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30-06, 270, and 7mm Remington magnum in a new, larger AR-style platform
Since the need for variety is a part of our strategy, we have two new hammer forge machines that, if all goes according to plan, will be up and running by the end of the year. This opens our opportunity to build hammer forged barrels up to .50 caliber.
Conclusion
Bear Creek Arsenal is committed to our customers in providing them with quality products at an affordable price while still ensuring that our employees continue to provide well for their families. Our goal is to provide a quality product by hiring and retaining skilled employees, and ensuring they have the right tools and equipment for the job. We manage over 400 CNC machines, mass producing our products. We are then able to capture economies of scale by running the machines at full capacity which translates to the lowest possible cost.
We continue to use the latest technology to ensure we continue to offer a variety of calibers for our customers on top of the 200 SKUs we already manufacture. We not only mass-produce variety, but we ensure that through effective quality control, our engineers’ designs are manufactured according to specifications.
Through mass production, experienced employees, and effective quality control measures we can ensure low prices for a high accuracy rifle.
