winchester model 1300 12 gauge serial number lookup

While not achieving the sales figures of the Remington Model 870. The Model 1200 was doing well and became popular as a field and police shotgun. One of the new designs to replace the classic Model 12 was the Model 1200 introduced in 1965. The immediate reaction of the shooting press and public was overwhelmingly negative: the popular verdict was that Winchester had sacrificed quality to the “cheapness experts,” and Winchester was no longer considered to be a prestige brand, causing a marked loss of market share.īut all was not lost in 1964.

The result was a new line of guns which replaced most of the older products in 1964. Janson had a new Winchester design group be formed to to advance the use of “modern” engineering design methods and manufacturing principles in gun design.

Winchester could no longer compete in price with Remington’s cast-and-stamped Model 870. Hunting went from a necessity to sport and the company’s flagship, the Model 12 was selling like hotcakes.Įxcept Remington entered the field with the incredible Model 870 Shotgun and undercutted the Winchester in production costs while still maintaining quality.īy the 1960s, with the rising cost of skilled labor was making it increasingly unprofitable to produce Winchester’s classic designs, as they required considerable hand-work to finish involving machined forgings. American Suburbia was growing and men and boys now had leisure time. In the the 1950s, Winchester was doing fairly well with the post war economic boom. The Model 1300 Shotgun, the final Winchester shotgun from the fabled gun valley of Connecticut.

Winchester model 1300 12 gauge serial number lookup