There are a lot of fantastic turkey-hunting shotguns on the market. If you want to, you can go spend thousands of dollars on a high-end new scattergun with a pistol grip and red dot scope all decked out in the fanciest camo patterns out there. Or you can go buy a cheap fixer-upper from the local pawnshop. It doesn’t really matter all that much, in the hands of the right hunter, both options will hammer gobblers into the dirt.
A cheap used shotgun just has a special aura about it. It’s like choosing cheap beer when offered champagne. When you hold a beat-up old gun, it just feels different. You can feel that gun has been to some places and seen some things. It’s like the experiences the gun has been through can be absorbed by whoever is holding it. It’s a quite similar sentiment to the Dierks Bentley and James Barker Band song New Old Trucks… They just ain’t making new old shotguns anymore.
The Pawn Shop Shotgun Stories As Told By Out Here Co.
Perhaps the best look into the magic of an old shotgun was recently portrayed through a 11-part video series produced by Out Here Co. Out Here Co. is a lifestyle brand that celebrates life like our fathers and grandfathers enjoyed it with a focus on the freedom and simplicity of the great outdoors. The gear they sell on their website has a fantastically retro aesthetic that can make a young man feel like he’s living in the good ole days. In addition to selling authentic goods, they also produce some pretty awesome original video content.
Their YouTube page is full of rustic-looking acoustic performances from a wide variety of country music singers. Last year, Out Here Co. also produced an epic series titled The Pawn Shop Shotgun. In the trailer for the video series, Jay Siske from Out Here Co. and Gary Stanton from the band Muscadine Bloodline stroll into a pawn shop and leave with a beat-up old shotgun that’s ready for action.
They don’t say what kind of shotgun it is in the first episode. However, it looks like an old Remington 870 Pump Action, which is the most classic shotgun of them all. Either that or a Mossberg 500, which is also an iconic piece.
Following The Epic Journey Of The Pawn Shop Shotgun
The Pawn Shop Shotgun series was a collaboration between Out Here Co. and the National Wild Turkey Federation. The footage is intentionally grainy and scratched to provide a warm retro feel. It’s like it’s an old video tape you just popped in the VCR at your uncle’s hunting shack. Even the font makes the video feel authentically classic. The concept was simple. Buy a beat-up old shotgun from a pawnshop then put it in the hands of talented turkey hunters throughout the spring of 2022. Each hunter took the gun afield for a turkey hunt and added to the firearms living legacy with a hunting story of their own.
Those stories and videos aimed to raise awareness for wild turkey conservation. At the end of the spring, the gun was raffled off to one lucky winner. Episode 1 opens with Jay Siske from Out Here Co. providing some context for the full lineup of videos. Then he heads down to Alabama with Austin Sills of Spring Legion to try and smoke a bird. Spring Legion is one of the fastest-growing gear and lifestyle brands in the turkey hunting world.
Unless you’ve ever tried it, you may not realize how hard turkey hunting actually is. That’s why Austin Sills missing a bird with an errant shot is actually a fitting start to the Pawn Shop Shotgun’s journey. However, he soon redeems himself and puts the first notch in the guns hit list.
Tune in back here on Outsider soon for Episode 2 featuring Lake Pickle from OnX Hunt.
