American gun maker Sig Sauer responded to the millions of women who purchased their first gun over the last three and a half years by creating the Rose community, centered entirely on the female gun owner.
In 2020, when COVID-related shutdowns began and civil unrest was prominent around the country, women across the country flocked into gun stores to find a means to protect themselves. In fact, on September 17, 2021, Breitbart News reported that during the COVID shutdowns, nearly half of all first-time gun buyers were women.
The Wall Street Journal reported a National Firearms Study which showed that 3.5 million women bought their first gun between January 2019 and April 2021.
Sig’s Rose community is designed to be a haven for the millions of women who purchased their first gun during the COVID shutdowns, as well as for those who may be purchasing their first gun now.
The community is Facebook-based and private, allowing women who may be timid in their approach to their first firearm to learn from other women who have been shooting for years. Women can exchange shooting tips with other women, and women who grew up in homes where firearms were always present can hear the stories of those who did not and vice versa.
On top of the personal exchange, Sig’s Rose community gives women the opportunity to learn from championship shooter Lena Miculek.
Lena is an 8-time World Champion, skilled in the use of a variety of firearms, who takes joy in working with women from all skill levels.
All these aspects of the Rose community come together in a program that literally provides a step-by-step guide that spans from holding a gun for the first time to going to the range to shoot for the first time and beyond. The goal is to demystify the firearm so women who are first-time gun buyers can feel confident when they pick up the gun, load it and manipulate its controls, and finally raise it up on target and pull the trigger.
Another aspect of Sig’s Rose community is the Sig P365 Rose. The P365 is one of the most popular handguns in the world, and for the Rose community, Sig released it in a .380 chambering, which means less recoil.
P365 Rose .380 on Left, Standard P365 9mm on Right (AWR Hawkins/Breitbart News)
The lower recoil makes the gun a better fit for many women, especially those of smaller stature.
Sig also makes the P365 Rose in 9mm, for women who are well-versed in that round, but the .380 is their nod to the ever-expanding demographic of women who are buying a gun for the first time.
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio and a Turning Point USA Ambassador. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal in 2010, a speaker at the 2023 Western Conservative Summit, and he holds a Ph.D. in Military History, with a focus on the Vietnam War (brown water navy), U.S. Navy since Inception, the Civil War, and Early Modern Europe. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.