CSAT Nacogdoches, Texas

ROMPER

Amateur
Went down to East Texas last November. Paul Howe has quite the facility, from a bunk house for week long classes that definitely save on hotel expenses with classroom, pro shop and area to sit back and exchange ideas with other students.
The range facility itself is pretty well laid out, with several ranges of different uses.
As soon as you drive out into the range facility your first range is 24 lanes wide and 100 yards long, complete with covered 100 yard shooting position and a side covered building for classroom.
Next to this is the vehicle range, with parked cars with steel plates out in front appears to be between 50-75 yards long and about 25 yards wide.
Next is a small 4-6 lane steel shooting area.
The next range is 16 lanes (if memory serves) and 50 yards long, pistol range on pea gravel.
Nest to this is a 100 yard rifle range with steel plates. Also an enclosed area to keep the rain off at the 100 yard line.
I did not go inside the shoot house but that would be the last range on this portion.
After to shoot house was a road back to the long distance range, also the location of the scrambler course. Paul's long distance course has hanging steel out to 800 yards and sits atop a nice hill with a view of the pates out to the 800 yard line.
The scrambler is a side course that takes you around the course by engaging targets at varying distances while you are moving around from the outside of the range itself and back to the top. It is an ass kicker and kind of humbling especially since it was designed by one of the runners of the Mogadishu Mile.
I will get pics up of the range later. But great facility and Paul is a class act.

R
 

hogarth

Member
I have a few pics of the range and barracks in the AAR I wrote for the AIT class back in November.

I will be heading back down there in May for another 3 day class.
 

Dane Ewing

Newbie
I hear rumors that Paul is retiring soon. Can anyone confirm this?
Haven't had the opportunity to train with him yet.
 

Default.mp3

Established
I hear rumors that Paul is retiring soon. Can anyone confirm this?
Haven't had the opportunity to train with him yet.

Paul Howe said:
Fifteen years ago I created CSAT, just prior to retiring from the Army. I felt I had more to give back to the tactical and shooting world and decided CSAT was the way to do it. I did a bit of contract work before it was all the rage to help get the business started and also went on the road doing 28-30 trips a year to conduct law enforcement training. After a few years, it became obvious that the road was a hardship tour I did not wish to continue on.

I started putting my money in land and carved out a training area. I first purchased 220 acres, then 110 as a buffer/additional training area and then purchased the barracks with its four acre tract. We finished our final projects this year and to be honest, I am out of gas.

Unfortunately, it takes a constant cash flow to stay on the porch which means a certain number of classes need to be run to ensure the business stays afloat. I have learned a new appreciation for small business owners on this journey as I have done our accounting, maintenance, building and teaching. An average work day without a class averages 9 hours and a work day during a class is 14-16 with the pre-work and post class chores. I am not complaining. As I say, it has kept me off the streets and out of the bars and channelized my energy to a positive end. As a business owner, I have scrubbed the toilets more times than I can recall. I have been blessed to work with conservative groups of people, government, LE and civilian who share the same work ethic and passion for protecting the nation, their families and themselves.

I will be 55 this year and don’t want to be a 60 year old running around in body armor trying to keep up with 30 year olds. I am too long out of the arena. I like to think that from 40-55 is a good age to give back to those who helped teach you and thus bring up the next generation. I can keep up, but it gets harder each passing year and with the demands of maintenance, scheduling, accounting, etc., there is only so much time in the day.

I have therefore decided to implement an extraction plan from CSAT and I am not quite sure what the future will hold. My plan is to stop within the next 1-4 years. I have started developing a staff and will leave it up to them on how the business will continue. My only requirement is that the quality stay the same or get better, it cannot drop. Further, I will be looking at options to transfer (sell/lease) CSAT in the future with several different options on the table:
  • Stay and consult
  • Stay and teach limited time
  • Sell as complete package (220/barracks-possibly 110)
  • Sell CSAT as package (Land/lesson plans-Business)
  • Lease the land
  • Part out the land for sale
If I don’t advertise my intentions, I limit who knows about this and which limits the potential customers interested in its purchase or lease. Finally, I will continue to teach and advertise classes and quietly discuss offers with anyone who is seriously interested.

Finally, I will be no longer teach any government classes as they have become C/D customers. This means I have A, B, C, D, and F customers, just like an old report card. I would prefer to work with A and B customers. They show up and pay on time. With the government and their constantly changing budgets and poor scheduling practices past government clients have cancelled classes on short notice. I am unable to generate another class as working Americans are forced to plan their time and vacations, etc. The government leaves you with “sorry” and that is unacceptable in the business world. I lose time and money and prospective students lose classes. With that, I have had federal clients remove all their equipment from my facility and in the future I will train only local and state Law Enforcement and civilians.

Source: http://www.combatshootingandtactics.com/published/info-letters/14/CSATUpdate_Jun14.pdf
 
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