Sales & Safety: Pocket
Guns & Holsters

Written By Massad Ayoob

2020

Compact and lightweight, the Ruger LCP II is designed to fit a variety of holsters.
The textured grip frame provides a secure and comfortable grip for users.

Pocket guns are incredibly popular, especially these days. If you follow online gun forums, you would easily gain the impression pockets just might be the single most popular place to hold a concealed handgun today. The more your customers know the subtle secrets of efficient pocket carry, the more your store will sell — as well as their related accessories.

The Safety Factor

What makes people hesitant about pocket carry? Everyone at some point has lost something out of their pocket on a sofa or chair, and gun buyers are horrified at the thought of it happening with — a firearm!

This is one reason why you should strongly recommend pocket holsters for pocket guns. A pocket holster is much more likely to keep the gun where it belongs. And it also keeps the gun from shifting in the pocket, assuring the user won’t have to grope for it or awkwardly maneuver it into a grasping position if he or she needs it in an emergency. (When Ruger includes a pocket holster with each LCP pistol, it’s not for nothing.)

Another key point: Always remind the buyer there should never be anything else in the pocket that holds the gun! Not only can fumbling for keys, coins or a comb accidentally cause a finger to contact the trigger, but other items will slow down access to the firearm when it’s needed.

Be sure to ask the customer what pocket they’re going to carry their firearm in. Super-tight “skinny jeans,” for example, just aren’t going to work: not for concealment, and not for quick draw. Some pants don’t have deep enough pockets to keep the back of the grip from becoming visible, compromising concealment.

Most trousers have angled-opening “slash pockets,” but some have wider pocket openings than others. Relaxed-fit jeans work okay. Casual slacks like Dockers are perfect for pocket carry. Cargo pants? Sure, but encourage the customer to use the regular side pocket: the lower cargo pocket is a longer reach, can “print” the gun more because of its lower drape and allow the pistol to bump uncomfortably against the leg.

Remind the customer he or she needs to test their draw several times (with the gun unloaded) to make sure it’s going to cleanly draw when needed.

Old Wisdom Aged Well

Some old wisdom on these topics has been lost to time. Sixty years ago, NYPD Inspector Paul B. Weston pointed out hammer spurs on revolvers were shaped sort of like fishhooks and could snag coming out of pockets. In the same time period, quick-draw expert and legendary concealed carry holster maker Chic Gaylord recommended drawing from the pocket with the thumb on the hammer spur, because it made the thumb a sort of “human hammer shroud” to prevent such snagging.

(This draw technique is one I adopted, even for spurless hammer and “hammerless” guns. The reason? It slims the profile of the drawing hand and allows a faster clearance of gun from pocket.)

Here’s an easy way to let the customer see and feel how it works. They don’t even have to be holding a gun. Tell them to put their hand in their side pants pocket, make a fist and pull the fist out quickly. Probably nine times out of 10, there will be a little “catch point” where the fist “sticks” in the pocket. Now tell them to hold their hand in their pocket as if all fingers except the trigger finger were holding a gun, with index finger straight, but with the thumb up on the back of the handgun.

Voila! The gun will come out of the pocket much faster, unless the customer’s hands are ham-sized. This thumb placement streamlines the shape of the hand. Note: It does tend to be more awkward with an auto pistol than with a revolver because the thumb has to come back farther.

Pocket Carry Advantages

Many of your customers want or need to stay “incognito” and hide their identity as armed citizens. Here are a couple advantages to doing so:

• In a lot of “dress code” situations where the shirt has to be tucked in and the coat removed, the pocket gun can remain hidden but readily available.

• If in an “iffy” risk situation, the hand can casually slide in the pocket and already be grasping a gun without anyone being tipped off. Starting with a drawing grasp in the pocket (trigger finger straight, remember!), it’s possible to draw and fire in half a second — twice as fast if they had to clear a cover garment, get their hand on a hip-holstered gun, draw and fire.

The “twice as fast” factor is true of most people who’ve worked with pocket carry, starting with the hand on the gun.

Choosing The Pocket Handgun

For starters, it’s gotta be small — obviously. The real choices come down to a subcompact semi-auto pistol or snub-nose small-frame revolver. The flat profile of the auto conceals with a little more discretion and comfort. I know a Five-Gun Master in IDPA who can’t carry openly at work, but wears an 11-shot 9mm in the pocket of his daily work “uniform” cargo pants and polo shirt. He alternates between the SIG P365 and the Springfield Hellcat. Each is about as big as most people can hide in a trouser pocket, too.

Sharing [pocket carry’s] lesser-known advantages with customers leads not only to more sales, but to customers who are better protected all day, every day.

It’s a personal choice, however. For me, while I’ve carried a lot of autos and a lot of revolvers, I settled on the “hammerless” lightweight J-Frame simply because it cleared the pocket faster — and five rounds of .38 Special right now suited my pocket gun needs better than a higher capacity auto pistol half a second or more slower. Again, let the customer decide.

Selecting The Pocket Holster

There are leather, Kydex and soft “rubbery” pocket holsters to choose from in a broad spectrum of brands. Each has their pros and cons. If I felt my inventory could support only one style in stock, I’d go with the latter. They’re ambidextrous, they tend not to come out with the gun on the draw and they’re generally the least expensive.

Keep in mind, you’re selling “the ins and the outs” here. We’ve explained the “outs” in terms of the draw. For the “in” part, remind the customer it’s always safer to insert a loaded gun into the pocket holster and then put the whole package into the pocket itself. (Advise them to keep their fingers clear of the gun muzzle while doing so.)
Pocket carry is popular and serves a definite purpose. Sharing its lesser-known advantages with customers leads not only to more sales, but to customers who are better protected all day, every day, almost everywhere.

Agree/disagree? Send the SI team an email: comments@shootingindustry.com.

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Sales & Safety: Pocket Guns & Holsters