What Women Want... In Defensive Firearms

I came across a 2017 article by Mass Ayoob at Shooting Industry Magazine on the topic of "Selling Defense Guns To Women: Perspectives From Successful Dealers." Besides advice on selling firearms to women was also information from a couple gun stores on the firearms that were their best sellers with women (with the emphasis on concealed carry). Notably, these were both stores that offered classes and apparently had ranges, so I suspect the results more likely represent what women choose after having shot different firearms. And while I recognize that the data is, well, dated, it is interesting nevertheless.

    The first gun shop highlighted was Harry Beckwith’s Gun Shop (actually 3 stores) in north central Florida. They noted that the SIG 938 in 9 mm and SIG 238 in .380 ACP (9mm Short) both sold very well, with the .380 Glock 42 and 9mm S&W Shield coming in behind them. The Ruger LCP and S&W Bodyguard .380 were not popular because of the double-action triggers. As far as holsters, the top seller was apparently Can Can Concealment holsters, followed by holsters from a Florida company called Bullseye.

    Next up was the Ukiah Gun Shop in Ukiah, California. They reported: “We have four really popular handguns among women: the S&W Shield, the BERSA Firestorm .380, the SIG P238 .380 and the Ruger LCR .38 Special revolver. The Shield is the single most popular, in 9mm.” Holster wise, the most popular with the ladies were “corset holsters” from Femme Fatale.

    I wish they had information from other stores, but it does give a sense of what women wanted in 2017. It is quite different from the firearms popular with the shooters at the Girl & A Gun (AG & AG) 12th Annual National Conference earlier this year, although there were several smaller framed guns in that list, as well. I'm a little leery of the many lists of the top guns recommended for women, though, because those lists mostly appear as lists of what a particular author would recommend and not what women actually choose.

    But the takeaway I gathered from Ayoob's article is that the women who are looking for a concealed carry pistol are looking for something that is (a) light and small (i.e., easy to conceal without requiring a whole new wardrobe), (b) doesn't require a lot of hand strength to fire (i.e., no DAO triggers), and (c) without substantial recoil (you will note from Ayoob's article that .380s and 9mm were popular, while even for the higher level shooters at the AG & AG conference, there were no .40s, .45s, or 10mm in their top 10 list). I suspect that if Ayoob updated his article today, you would probably see some newer models such as the SIG 365 or S&W's Bodyguard 2.0 or Ruger LCP Max, but the overall characteristics sought by the woman concealed carriers would probably not be much different now than in 2017.

    But Ayoob's article also addressed long arms as well. While modern sporting rifles were popular in Florida, but mostly banned in California, it was interesting to note that in both locations, shotguns were popular. And the action (pump or semi-auto) didn't seem important. Rather, it was the recoil. In the California store, 20-guage shotguns with youth stocks were the most popular with woman shooters; but in the Florida stores (where they taught to shoot off-the-shoulder) women would also buy 12 gauge because the recoil wasn't as much an issue.