SHOT Show 2025 Day Two: In The Thick Of It

Day two of SHOT Show has come to an end and that means it is time for a roundup of the day’s going-ons with the TFB team. We have developed a reputation as a publication for covering SHOT Show thoroughly, both the big releases and some off-the-wall and niche things as well. I thought it would be interesting to fill the readers in on what it is like to cover the show and about some of our processes to add a little color commentary and perspective on this crazy operation.

This is my fourth year covering SHOT for TFB, and every year is different while still being somewhat similar. The flow of most days is the same: get up early, get ready, post an article or three if you have time, then get over to the show. Doors open at 8:30 each day and there is a major concentration of people outside the doors before the official opening time. On the first day, the crowd is charged up and ready to go, but as the week progresses the morning crowd gets a little lighter with each passing day. This is Las Vegas after all, and people tend to party hard after the show closes each day.

I love the mornings at SHOT because the passageways are less crowded and I can move quickly between booths and get access to the people and items I need to see to write up articles. Each of our writers has a list of visits that we need to make during the show. We at least get eyes on each one but there is simply not enough time to engage with every booth. If there is something new or interesting that catches our eye we stop, and we always try to drop in to say hi to friends and colleagues that we typically see at the show.

To put the scale of SHOT in perspective, the total show floor space is something like 800,000 square feet. That is 18 acres of booths large and small to navigate through. North of 50,000 people attend the show so getting around feels a lot like car traffic in the big city. Traffic jams arise for good reasons and bad reasons, and after about 3 PM most are a result of free beer being offered at a booth. Moving between all those booths and around all those people means we are on our feet from open to close and comfortable walking footwear is one of the most important tools we bring to Vegas each year.

Working a booth usually entails grabbing an employee who looks like they know what is happening, and asking who the right person is to explain the new products. We get introduced and start working through the new products, taking pictures and writing down details and specs. The pictures we take are not typically the quality that we like to put in our long-form content because the lighting is terrible, the booths can be crowded, and there is a real lack of picturesque backgrounds. But the authenticity of it all comes through in the pictures, and hopefully you feel like you are on this crazy quest with us.

Not every booth exists to show off new products though. Many are convenient locations for manufacturers and suppliers to meet with companies they work closely with. Others make great, popular products and have their hands full just meeting consumer and industry demand for their products. For example, Sierra Bullets is mainly focusing on making as many quality bullets as they can each year. Their main product update this year is new “Match Packs” of 250 bullets instead of only selling 500-round packages. That will be a nice product to see on the market, but it is hard to write a full story about. But I for one am glad they are focused on producing enough 77-grain Matchkings to meet demand instead of adding a new product and not being able to make enough of that, or of the Matchkings.

Another example is the good dudes at Ameriglo. They make a ton of iron sights for pistols each year. Many manufacturers use them as an OEM supplier, and they are also found on every US federal law enforcement Glock these days. They had some product line expansions, but their main focus is on consistently manufacturing quality sights for buyers large and small.

Once the show wraps for the day at 5:00 the real work begins. I generally grab something to eat while I work on cleaning up my notes and culling my photos, then head back to my hotel to write. Most of us will write, format, and post articles well into the night. You may have noticed that many of our articles are posted at night, that is why.

Our friends at TFBtv do something similar, but creating videos is a different process than writing an article. It is much more team-oriented, and they have a dedicated video editor who turns their raw footage into the slick videos you are used to seeing on TFBtv and TFBtv Show Time. Unlike the written side, where we take notes and make sure things are readable on the back end, they have to make sure the discussion is usable and answers the right questions in real-time. They make an extraordinary number of videos each year because they are very, very good at getting the info you all want to hear without spending too long in any one place.

The video and blog sides typically work independently at SHOT Show, but we share a lot of hot tips on interesting things that deserve more coverage. Today I was making some visits when I ran into James Reeves and his camera guy Ryan. We chatted about cool things we had seen and I mentioned that I had an appointment with P7Pro to talk about new production P7 squeeze cocker pistols. James wanted to check that out, and after a detour through B&T to look at some very cool stuff and a visit with Mr. Beretta himself, we headed down to the dungeon.

Ok, it wasn’t really a dungeon, but that is what many people call the bottom floor of the Venetian Expo building. Most of the big-name companies in the shooting world are upstairs on the main floor, with booths like Beretta, Mossberg, Leupold, Nightforce, Palmetto State Armory, Glock, and FN (the main-floor feel extends over a walkway into the Caesar’s expo area as well). Upstairs it is not uncommon to see belt-fed machine guns and foreign military officers in full uniform walking around. Downstairs feels much more like a gun show at your local fairground, but larger, and no one is allowed to sell anything. SHOT is a trade show, not a sales show, so nothing is actually bought or sold there. Companies can make deals and contracts do get signed, but I can’t just buy a new product if I see something I really like.

Downstairs has smaller booths loaded with products both good and bad, and it feels a little like gold panning. You have to move a lot of sand and dirt to find the gold flakes, but there is absolutely gold down there to find. Some of our biggest articles and videos in years past have come out of our time exploring the basement.

In today’s installment, we visited with Brett of P7Pro and checked out his efforts to breathe new life into the platform. I took notes off-camera while James interviewed him, and it was clear this was a passion project from a man who deeply and truly loves the P7. Keep an eye out for that video and article when we get them posted.

Once we wrapped there James asked if there was anything else cool in the basement and I told him about my editor Matt’s article about SNT Defense bringing the classic Daewoo K2 back to the US market. We headed over there and they ended up shooting videos of both the K2 and the newer K13 rifles. This ended up being very interesting because the K2 is a legend and the K13 could be a very good gun when it makes it to store shelves, but also fun. Charlie from SNT Defense gave it his all by doing the interview in English even though that is not his first language, and he gave it 100% effort. You guys are going to love those videos when they drop.

Once we finished up in the basement I split off and hurried between booths and appointments for the rest of the day. There are some very cool articles coming soon, and some really cool products coming that are not ready for publicity yet. The show closed for the day, and I made the sacred pilgrimage to In-n-Out before settling in to write up some articles, including this one.

SHOT Show is one of a kind. It can be very frustrating at times, and some of the product pitches strain credulity, but overall it plays a huge role in networking and planning reviews and long-form content for the coming year. It is also a unique opportunity to see old friends and to run into your online friends in person. We also love running into our readers in the show. I can’t count the number of times someone has seen the red TFB patch on my name tag and come up to tell me they read the blog all the time. This is not a day job for any of the writers. We do this because we love it, and getting to run into some of you at SHOT to hear that you love it too is very rewarding. So, this is all a very long way of saying thank you for reading and watching our content. I hope this peek behind the curtain was interesting, but it is time to wrap this up and crank out some more articles. Show coverage will continue through the end of the month so there is a lot more to come!