After Winchester announced the demise of the M70
and the M94, I requested a current catalog thinking they would say no. After all they were no longer accepting any orders for these and declining to repair them. Guess what I got today,
a new 2006 catalog and nothing indicating that they ceasing production. My hunch is that they
are simply trying to close the New Haven plant to
save money and get away from the Union. I hope some AMERICAN company takes over, buys or leases the Winchester name from Olin, and makes major changes that result in higher quality M70's
and M94's.

Just my two cents worth.

As a life long Winchester owner and fan, I have been very disappointed in the quality over the past couple of years. I can honestly understand why any company refuses to be hold hostage over labor demands from labor that is producing a sub-standard product at an above market price. My only hope, that no matter where Winchester's are produced, they are done so with pride and the quality that has made the 94 action endure since 1894.

John

I hope they break away from the union and hire some employees who have the desire and the will to want to do good work and are glad to have the job and want to keep it!

Unions exist for the betterment of the union, not the workers anymore....they sure helped out a lot with the auto makers, airlines and teacher's lately. They seem to be leading the way with left leaning socialist ideology, second only to the ACLU!! There is no wonder why Howard Dean is in bed with them.

I'll bet Winchester could make a quality product for a fair price if unions are the problem AND.... they could shed the unions and overhead burden they bring. Otherwise the alternative is make them overseas with cheaper labor like others have done successfully.

Kinda ironic, most of the big business with Unions such as GM, Ford, All the Airlines......are the ones folding up

A few years ago while on a business trip to Australia I met a senior union official from the UK who down there trying to recruit new members and create new chapters. What was interesting about this chap was that over a drink he attempted to justify communism to us and started going on how capitalism breeds corruption and subjugation of the lower classes. He said that there is now a class war going on and that there is some sort of multinational globalisation conspiracy at the root or it all. After debating this with him all evening, I was very concern and disturbed about the following:

1) Why was this gentleman who represents a UK establishment meddling in a foreign countries labour affairs?
2) Why was he pushing communism as the proper ideology?
3) How could he criticise globalisation, when he himself was down there pushing it?
4) Who could he (a year 10 high school drop out) have attained such a senior union position?

I come to the following conclusions:

Their home based union must be in a serious state decline after having gutted out and lost almost all the heavy industries of the UK. They chose globalisation as their salvation, but at the same time are attempting to conceal it as a “we are here to set you free crusadeâ€. Lastly, why choose this gentleman, well he is a Crusader. His crusade is that of Marx and crusaders always draw a crowd. Being less educated may make it easier to control and point him in various directions, plus converts might see him as sort of a fellow repressed pear, thus making it an easier sell. Good capitalistic business strategy!