THE VUDU LINE

RECOIL: When people hear the name EOTECH, the holographic weapon sight immediately comes to mind — an incredibly fast, close-quarter-battle sight that has been successfully employed by special operations counter-terror elements across the globe. If you own the holographic sight market, why enter the crowded variable power optic segment?

Aaron Hampton: You’re right. We’re best known for our holographic weapon sights. I think EOTECH surprised the optic industry at the 2015 SHOT show by entering the magnified optic market, which we did with three models in three different power ranges: 1-6x, 2.5-10x, and 3.5-18x.

While some viewed the entry with skepticism, the line had actually been in development since 2011, some four years earlier. Prior to that, EOTECH had looked hard at the variable power scope market and anticipated an increase in popularity. We looked at several established companies, and in lieu of acquiring one, we decided we could do better by launching a select line in-house, with a gradual layout of a family of optics — and that’s just what we did. Poof, the Vudu line was born.

With that said, we had to be very careful; as you mentioned, magnified optics were all new to EOTECH at the time. Had to do it right, we couldn’t make mistakes, and we had to do it with the lowest possible development cost. We strived to give the consumer