Barnes Bullets celebrates 75 years with a passion

Shooting Industry, August, 2007 by Clair Rees

The country's oldest bullet manufacturer, Barnes Bullets, got its start in the early 1930s, when Fred Barnes began making bullets in his Bayfield, Colo., basement workshop. Made of pure copper tubing with a pure lead core, Fred's bullets were prized by hunters for their dependably deadly performance.

Fred later sold the company, which became Colorado Custom Bullets in Montrose, Colo. In the meantime, newlyweds Randy and Coni Brooks moved from a dairy farm in nearby Grand Junction to New Mexico, where Randy became a saddlemaker. The couple also bought an Indian trading post and made turquoise jewelry.

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"Rogers White, a Grand Junction gunsmith, began urging me to buy a bullet company he knew was for sale," Randy recalls. "In its heyday, Barnes employed more than 100 people. It had dwindled to a two-man operation and the owners wanted to sell.

"We talked ourselves into buying the company in 1974. The first thing we did was change its name back to Barnes Bullets and relocate to American Fork, Utah, our old hometown."

The first years of their new business were difficult, Coni recalls.

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"We'd purchased a hand-operated press and some other antiquated machinery, which we installed in the 580-square-foot basement of our tiny home. Our two young daughters shared the only bedroom, while Randy and I slept on a hideaway bed in the front room," Coni said.

The fledgling business was a real family operation.

"Everyone pitched in to help. Our 4-year-old daughter, Jessica, and Chandra, who was only 3, inserted cores in jackets. They earned piecework wages. My brothers, Leslie and Bobby, regularly helped out and my sister, Ginger, came by to see what she could do. My father, Bob, and mother, Beverly, gave unbelievable support. Barnes would not have survived those early years without our family's help," Randy said.

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Despite all their efforts, the new company wasn't setting sales records.

"First year sales grossed just $12,000," Randy recalls. "The main thing keeping the business going was I earned more money roping steers at rodeos--and I wasn't all that great a roper! I scrounged additional seed money by selling a number of fine guns I'd collected."

To test bullets, Randy hunted 100 days of the year.

"To support these trips, I earned money by building custom rifles and installing more than 3,000 KDF muzzle-brakes," Randy said. "Those were the good old days. Thank goodness they're gone!"

X-Bullet Hits Market

Randy and Coni first made bullets to the original Barnes design, but this was soon to change.

"I was hunting brown bear in Alaska when the idea for the X-Bullet came to me," Randy said. "I wasn't happy with the results lead-core bullets gave me. I wanted a fast-expanding bullet that would hold together and reliably penetrate the largest, toughest game."

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Randy began experimenting with the 100-percent copper bullet that became the X-Bullet Barnes introduced in 1989.

"The first game I shot with the new bullet was a 9 1/2-foot brown bear. The bear dropped on the spot, so I knew I was onto something," he said.

Despite the success of the bullet, Randy continued to experiment with the design.

"We found that cutting a series of relief grooves in the bullet's shank allowed greater velocities at lower pressures. In addition, the rings virtually eliminated copper fouling and significantly improved accuracy. The result was the Triple-Shock X-Bullet--the all-time, best-selling bullet that's become the backbone of our company," Randy said.

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"We expanded the X-Bullet family with all-copper XPB pistol bullets originally developed for military applications. We also developed a series of muzzleloader bullets, again patterned on the X-Bullet design," Randy said.

Randy continues pushing the envelope in bullet design.

"Demand for our Triple-Shock (TSX) bullet has skyrocketed. It's become the 'go-to' bullet for countless hunters and guides, who have absolutely come to depend on its amazing performance. We've recently taken the Triple-Shock design a step further by adding a streamlined Delrin tip and a patented, heavier-than-lead Silvex core. The result is the Maximum-Range X-Bullet (MRX). This new premium bullet is for hunters who don't mind paying a premium price for a bullet that delivers dependable Triple-Shock performance at very long range," Randy said.

This year, Barnes introduced the Varmint Grenade, a highly frangible, lead-free varmint bullet that delivers explosive results.

Sportsmen's Voice

The success Barnes Bullets enjoys is reflected in the expanding size of its manufacturing facilities.

"Quickly outgrowing our first 580-square-foot operation, we added additional buildings over the years," Randy said. "Our first big move was to a 6,050-square-foot concrete-block building we constructed next to our home. In 1996, we built our current 40,000-square-foot plant in Lindon, Utah."

The company's new 75,000-square-foot headquarters is now being erected near Mona, Utah, 40 miles south of its present location.