You know I think it is about atitude more than anything. I believe its always bad to try to market share by putting out lower value rifles, cars or anything. My company is doing that now. We have the best fiber optics gear in the business. All people love our gear. But hate the pricetag. But some buy it anyway. Now those are lifetime buyers. Now we are putting out a very cheap version, now that reputation might stick with us for decades to come. We are not the golden standard any more.

Another example, is cadilac. People used to buy them for thier reputation and generally status symbol. Now they put out these cheap cadis. I believe they hurt their reputation. For the short term they gain market share, but long term, thier long time big rollers buyers, won' t buy them. Not a status symbol anymore.

Let me give you an example. Sako has not ever put out a bottom value gun. People will pay that 1K pricetag just for reputation. Now they own Tikka. Still quality gun, but less price. Now any lower than that, and they will be hurtin thier reputation. I hope they don' t follow Winchester or Remington with thier " 710" versions just to compete.

The only company that has gotten away with this plan of getting market share, is maybe Weatherby with thier Walmart special versions.

Look at Harley Davidson. They are still working on repairing thier reputation from the 70' s version of their " cheaper to compete with Japan" motorcycles. I had one of these peices of junk. But still ride HD. And still try to convince people that that decade was just a bad time.

Your reputation is an invaluable thing. Companies like my own needs to protect that over all else. I talk to the VP' s about this. But thier thought is " Mark it saves jobs" and gets us over this hump in the economy. But I say " once you go down this road, there is no turning back" . Savage makes a good firearm for the money, but still struggling to repair thier reputation.