They were cheaper than pump/ auto guns, but were multi shot which were better than a single shot. They were primarily meant for an economy waterfowl gun. Dad bought me one for my first hunting gun: 36" bbl 12 gauge JC Higgins for 25.00 in 1977. I was awful proud of that, shot my first deer with it, but as soon as I could afford to, replaced it with a pump gun. I bought one of the Savage 12 gauge rifled slug guns about 20 years ago, and was far from satisfied with it. too darn long , feeding wasn't very good, and I wasn't impressed with the accuracy. I stuck with my Ithaca Deerslayer.