Lancaster Arms: Still the "BP" of the Firearms Industry

So, this blog has been up over six months now. Rational people might assume that Lancaster Arms would have “seen the light” by now, and fixed the many problems with its business. But has that happened? Nah. Not a chance. You see, getting Lancaster to “a good place” would take an owner who cared. And Chet Durda, the owner of Lancaster Arms, simply does not care. At least, that’s the only rational explanation for behavior and customer service that remains, in every way, bottom-of-the-barrel in the firearms industry.

One might think that having been publicly called out to the extent Lancaster has, that they’d be on their very best behavior until things settled down. But to think that, is to underestimate how much Chet Durda really, truly does not care. The man, and several of his staff, continue to lie to customers as if they don’t even know that not lying is actually an option. As a case in point, read this recent disaster of an experience that a Pennsylvania man had with Lancaster. When he ordered his rifle in January, the fork-tongued Durda told this man his rifle would be done in 8-10 days. It then took 5 MONTHS for the customer to get…a defective rifle. All the while, when he contacted Lancaster about these constant delays, he was shamelessly lied to multiple times by Chet Durda and the rest of the incompetent stooges employed at Lancaster.

To those of us familiar with Lancaster Arms and its owner Chet Durda, that episode is not at all surprising. Several of us (including yours truly) have had similar experiences, and the basic story is always the same: Durda tells you you’ll get your gun in a timeframe he knows damn well he can’t deliver on, people eventually call up wondering where in the hell their rifle is, Durda and his bumbling staff go down their list of “the dog ate your AK” type excuses, and eventually, after all that, Lancaster winds up delivering a rifle that has something wrong with it. There are literally dozens and dozens of versions of this basic story documented online, from people who exercised the bad judgment to trust anything Chet Durda says. In fact, one can now read certain gun forums and find the term “Durda’d”, to describe when one has been lied to. Yes folks, you KNOW things are bad when your last name literally becomes a synonym for lying!

So what’s the result of all this? Well, it’s pretty much as you might guess. An “F” rating with the Better Business Bureau, a growing problem file with the Arizona Attorney General’s Office, and a reputation (especially online) that speaks to the level of distrust the firearms community has developed towards Lancaster Arms and Chet Durda. These days, when new people stop by a firearms forum and ask “I’m thinking of buying a rifle. What do you guys think of Lancaster?”, without fail, those new people are met with an avalanche of warnings to stay the hell away from Lancaster. Apparently Lancaster never heard the saying, “Nothing travels faster than light, with the possible exception of bad news.”

There you have it, folks. Doing business with Lancaster Arms is bad, bad news, and if you attempt to buy something from them…don’t say you weren’t warned.

As a reminder, for those new to this blog (Google Analytics tells me there are several of you), read all the posts here to get a good sense of the problems with Lancaster. In particular, read the January complaint threads. You'll quickly learn why this company is SO bad...there's actually a blog dedicated to discussing how bad it is.