Randomly while cleaning out some random stuff around the office we stumbled upon a Coonan flash drive from Shot Show circa 2015. My first thought was to throw it into the garbage can but it did remind me.... Did Coonan manage to resurrect itself or if it was still a smoldering trash heap, promising to return (and hopefully also return all the money they stole from customers in the form of pre-orders for guns and repairs sent in and never repaired or returned).
In August of 2019 we placed a sizable order with Coonan for about $20,000 worth of firearms. We knew there would be a slight backlog but expected delivery within a few months. A month or two later we got a phone call from another dealer we're friends with asking if we heard anything from Coonan. He told us he had placed an order in May and had not received his firearm and was unsuccessful in reaching anyone at Coonan. Considering the size of our order we figured we better investigate. We tried to call and email numerous times over the next few days with no response so we anticipated that they were probably circling the drain. There were complaints on their company Facebook page about accepting payments for pre-orders and not delivering as well as customer firearms sent in for repair that were not repaired or returned. We decided the best course of action was to file a credit card dispute and not take a risk that they dissolve and we lose $20,000.
So..... where is Coonan now? Well, after a quick Google search it was pretty clear that they're gone (again). This isn't the first time Coonan has gone out of business either. For a long time (probably six plus months between fall of 2019 and spring of 2020) the Coonan website (www.coonaninc.com) had a heading stating:
Coonan Inc. wants to reach out to our loyal customers and dealers…Coonan Inc. is NOT GONE!
Due to contractual obligations, we have been unable to discuss the big changes that are happening.We sincerely apologize for the lack of communication. This process has taken far longer than we had anticipated, but there have been a lot of things going on behind the scenes. We have been working very hard to restructure the company in ways that will allow us to serve our customer’s needs better and faster. These changes will also allow us to pursue even more exciting new projects.
While obstacles can pop up easily during this type of transition, we do hope to have things up and running by the end of November. Once we have completed the process, we will contact our customers with delivery dates on orders for pistols, FAL receivers, and accessories.
Thanks again. We truly appreciate your patience!
We had a feeling they weren't going to recover after being down for that long. At some point after the spring of 2020 their website domain expired and someone snatched it up and the URL now hosts ads. Their Facebook page is gone, although it was mostly filled with complaints toward the end. No updates on Twitter either but the account remains. Their YouTube channel is still live too at https://www.youtube.com/c/coonan357mag/videos
The assets of Coonan were auctioned off. There is a post at thehighroad.org detailing this with more complaints about customers getting stiffed by Coonan. Look on Google or another search engine and you'll find more forums and posts with a similar theme. I couldn't find any court documents outlining a bankruptcy filing so I'm not sure what the exact status, legally speaking. I know quite a few individuals lost their full deposits on pre-ordered firearms.
So.... back to the thumb drive. We know that there aren't a significant amount of resources for Coonan products and there are still many owners or collectors that may be seeking information about Coonan products. The contents of the thumb drive will probably be helpful to many people searching out information on Coonan. Oddly, they actually included a fully functional local copy of their website from around the time the press kits were distributed so you can actually browse an archive of their website. Below is a screenshot of the folder hierarchy of the flash drive and we'll include links to many of the individual files as well as a full zip of the entire drive (about 500MB).
You can browse the archived version of Coonan's website.
Below is a list of the PDF files that can be downloaded by clicking on the name.
- Coonan fireball gun mat (pdf)
- Coonan fireball in store banner (pdf)
- Coonan difference (pdf)
- Coonan 357 print sell sheet (pdf)
- Coonan 357 email sell sheet (pdf)
- Coonan dealer network sheet (pdf)
- Coonan Compact Operator Guide (pdf)
- Coonan Classic Operator Guide (pdf)
- Coonan 2015 MSRP Price List (pdf)
The full thumb drive archive is also available (487MB). The thumb drive contains the PDF's above along with some product photos and the archived website.
It is a shame to see a firearm company go out of business but it is much worse when they screw over customers in the process. We hope you find some of this information helpful, whether for maintaining firearms you already own or for just learning more about Coonan products.
Feel free to leave a comment and share your experiences with Coonan. Tell us your story if you were one of the unlucky customers that ended up taking a loss by pre-ordering with them or if your firearm was in for service when they closed.
