Heckler & Koch Expanding Plant to Meet Domestic Production Needs…It’s a news headline that is a welcome sight to many in the firearms industry and signals that with the outcome of the recent Presidential election that larger companies like Heckler & Koch feel the next four years will be favorable to them in terms of tax credits and national gun laws.
This coming summer of 2017 the Columbus, Georgia production facilities are scheduled to receive more than $28 Million dollars worth of upgrades and construction projects, the cornerstone of these upgrades will be the new 50,000 square foot that will employ more than 80 new full time employees. These new employees are going to be surrounded by the most advanced production equipment that the German Engineers at Heckler & Koch could spend their Euros on. The facility will be partially staffed by technicians and engineers from H&K home headquarters, but the bulk of the workforce is planned to be local Georgians.
HKUSA CEO Francisco Hidalgo was quoted as saying “The HK products will maintain the same level of quality and reliability that the consumer has grown to expect from HK. Our company motto is and will remain ‘No Compromise‘.” It was also alluded to that the State of Georgia’s pro development business model was also helped to create an environment where the company and its board of directors felt comfortable investing such a substantial amount of money into the plant and the local Columbus, Georgia area.
The recent upswing in sales of newer Heckler & Koch pistols like the VP9 and the announced release of the VP9 Tactical and other models certainly will give the workers at the new factory plenty of orders to fill. It has not been officially announced what models of firearms H&K intends to produce at the new plant but making an educated guess I would say the VP9 series and the newly rereleased MP5 pistol variant are good bets to be produced there. I like many others at the site are opening questioning what else Heckler & Koch has up their sleeves, maybe a new rifle since currently the only rifles in the H&K line up are very cost prohibited for the average working man. It plane business terms you dont drop $28.5 million dollars into a plant just to make one variety of pistol. I will of course try to pry some hints out of the Heckler & Koch reps at SHOT Show 2017 this week, but I don’t think the Germans will be loose lipped about their plans. I will regardless try to get something from them, my other H&K master plan is to get to try the VP9 at Industry Day at the Range.
This week we will be at SHOT Show 2017, if you are at the show try to find us on the floor, we are always willing to talk about guns, gear and gadgets. Stay tuned for our daily updates from the show
Rick
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