Fudd Friday: Thompson/Center Makes A Comeback In 2025

Thompson/Center @ TFB:

• Review: Thompson Center's T/CR22 (10/22 Clone)
• Smith & Wesson Plans to Sell Thompson/Center Arms Brand
• Thompson Center Reintroduces G2 Contenders
• Thompson/Center Venture: Entry level priced MOA rifle!

Getting The Band Back Together

Founded in 1965, Thompson/Center saw its initial success by building quality muzzleloaders and pistols specifically designed for big game hunting. However, despite a faithful fan base, the company has been defunct for several years now.

The key person behind Thompson/Center’s rejuvenation is Gregg Ritz. Along with his adventures on hunting and outdoors television shows, Ritz was previously the owner of Thompson/Center before selling the company to Smith & Wesson in 2007. While Smith & Wesson did innovate and brought out new models, they let the brand taper away into nothingness eventually, with production winding down in 2021 as they looked for a new owner.

That took a while. Eventually, Ritz bought the company back in 2024 and has since been working on rebuilding the company, with a lineup based around the classic models that customers loved. One of the big starting steps was a return of production to Rochester, New Hampshire; Smith & Wesson had run production out of their base in Springfield, Massachusetts.

Now, about a year after taking control of the company again, Ritz has Thompson/Center ready to sell guns to consumers once more.

Back to basics

The first firearm line from the rejuvenated company is the Thompson/Center Encore Prohunter series. Take a good look—it’s very familiar. The Encore break-action single-shots were the company’s flagship firearms for a very long time because of their versatility. Shooters could buy an Encore rifle and add a second barrel that fit right in, without needing any gunsmithing. Remove the hinge pin from the barrel and frame, and the other barrel will fit in the same spot.

This was particularly appealing to hunters who might want a centerfire rifle for big game, a shotgun for turkey hunting and a muzzleloader for special-season hunting. The Thompson/Center was not a cheap firearm, but the easily-swapped barrels made it possible for a shooter to own a high-quality firearm that could manage just about any hunting for a reasonable price, as long as you bought extra barrels.

For 2025, that formula is back, and the company says its new-production firearms will be able to mix and match with older-production Encore barrels. This is a big bonus for owners who already have a lot of money invested with the brand.

At this time, the basic Encore Prohunter models will come with 26-inch barrels for the centerfire rifle and rifled shotgun barrels; muzzleloaders will come with 28-inch barrels. However, there are much shorter barrels coming down the road, as the single-shot pistol models will return in the next few weeks, certainly in time for you to be practised up for fall hunting season. Shotgun barrels are also coming shortly, in 12, 20 and 410 gauge.

All rifled barrels are precision-fluted and button-rifled, and will come with threaded muzzle that matches the SAAMI suggestions for that calibre.

Barrels and receivers will both be available as individual purchases from Thompson/Center. While the barrels are not serialized, customers will not be able to order them directly from Thompson/Center through the mail—they must be purchased through a dealer. Speaking of which, if you’re looking to order something from the new lineup, Thompson/Center is distributing through Sports South, Bill Hicks and Zanders.

What’s next?

Pistols and smoothbore shotguns are high priorities for Thompson/Center, especially the scatterguns, as turkey season is just about upon us. But in the coming months, they plan to push past the Encore Prohunter series. In the summer, they’ll be working on bringing the Triumph muzzleloader back, as well as a Firestick-capable version of the Encore muzzleloader. From there, it looks like they’re aiming at getting back into the bolt-action game, too, working on returning the Icon to production. After that, their social media channels also indicated Thompson/Center is considering the return of their custom shop, perhaps sometime in 2027.

In other words, just about everything that customers loved about the brand appears to be coming back. If you think you might be interested, keep an eye on TCArms.com as well as their Facebook page.