Five straight years of falling NICS checks, and a generation taking over
Background checks for gun sales have now fallen five years in a row, something that never happened before 2022. A long Tactical Retailer column argues the industry faces a second shift at the same time, as millennials take over leadership from retiring boomers and Gen X.
The short version
The writer, who has 15 years in the industry, says the most common one-word description of the business today is "uncertainty." NICS checks, imperfect but consistent, had never declined two years running until 2022, and 2025 marked the fifth straight year of decline. He acknowledges the 2020 spike, a 39% jump fueled by COVID, unrest and an election, was bound to correct, but notes the three-year rolling average kept falling 9%, 11% and 6% in 2023, 2024 and 2025. Distributor data from NASGW on ammunition and optics shows a similar trend.
Meanwhile, boomers are retiring and leading-edge Gen Xers are leaving early, putting millennials, especially "Xennials" born 1977 to 1983, into strategic roles. His prediction: an industry that looks less like the recent boom years and more like the static 1990s, where new products and real relationships, not simply having stock, drive sales.
Key points
- Unprecedented decline: Five consecutive years of falling NICS checks through 2025.
- The 2020 outlier: A 39% jump, double the next largest one-year increase of 19% in 2012 and 2016.
- Generational shift: Millennials are stepping into leadership as mentors retire.
- Relationships: Shops will favor long-term partners over reps chasing a quarter-end sale.
- Marketing: He expects reputable content creators to matter more and social media to plateau as guns become harder to promote on the platforms.
Bottom line
This is one industry veteran's opinion, but the NICS numbers behind it are real. For buyers, a slower market can mean more competition for your business; for shops and brands, he argues, the playbook of the 1990s may be the one to relearn.
Source: Tactical Retailer.