Among the machines, two have attracted our interest in particular: a very modern machine for the rifling of barrels of any caliber, technologically superior even for the standards of many big seized International companies; then, a massive five-axis machine used for the manufacture of wooden stocks and pistol grips, a unique piece of technology designed specifically for Chiappa Firearms.

Every single firearm manufactured by Chiappa undergoes several tests and quality controls all through its manufacturing process and an adhesive label with a QR code is applied to each firearm, to be scanned on terminals scattered all through the Chiappa Firearms plant; this allows workers to keep track of all the quality controls and tests that the gun underwent through the various stages of manufacturing, from early working to packaging and shipment, and immediately pinpoint potential issues. Firearms that show malfunctions or defects are sent back to the relevant department so that the issues may be fixed. 

At the end of the visit, the guests were given an extensive introduction to Chiappa Firearms’ best and latest product – the eagerly anticipated CBR-9 Black Rhino Personal Defense Weapon – with a full overview of its technical and manufacturing features, intended modes of use, manual of arms, and disassembly.

The CBR-9 was at the center of the guests’ attention the following day, with five samples available for testing at the Shooting Academy Club. The guests were manageability, light weight, low recoil and accuracy of the CBR-9 Black Rhino – definitely a good sign ahead of the commercial availability of this new weapon, announced for the next months.

As communication experts, we have noted that a big part of the “positive surprise” that the new Chiappa CBR-9 Black Rhino has inspired in all the attendees has been due – we have to admit – to one particular aspect: for years in fact we have been used to think about Chiappa Firearms as a manufacturer of playful guns, strictly speaking, and because of this, apparently less challenging from an industrial point of view.

But since the company tour first, then after the field test of the new Chiapa CBR-9, all attendees have realized that there is an ever more strict relationship between the technological evolution that has characterized the Chiappa company in recent years and its present ability to realize technically demanding weapons, exactly like the CBR-9 Black Rhino.

Available for the guests to test fire was also a wide choice of Chiappa’s hunting, sport shooting, and defense-oriented firearms, ranging from historic replicas such as the Enfield 1858 muzzleloader and the Spencer lever-action carbine down to the model 1898 lever-action shotgun and other modern Winchester-based lever-action rifles, as well as the FAS 6007 olympic pistol, the Rhino line of revolvers – including the newest Charging Rhino and Nebula variants – and the 9mm and .22 Long Rifle versions of the M1, PAK, RAK and M4 lines.

The sheer quantity of firearms and ammunition made available by the company allowed the guests to familiarize with the Chiappa Firearms products line and test the guns extensively out of the typical controlled conditions of in-house shooting galleries where this kind of test is normally carried out.

With all the guns made “scorching” in the real sense of the term, also because of the beautiful, but implacable sun.

The experience of the Chiappa Firearms International Media Days shows how important it is nowadays, even for the best-established companies, to hold this kind of events in good considerations as part of a good marketing communication strategy.

Hopes are that time may be ripe – or soon to be ripe – to plan similar events for a much wider attendance, down to the general public, in order to refresh the public image of the civilian arms industry which, particularly in Europe, has been tarnished relentlessly by decades of unchallenged anti-gun propaganda.