Duty holsters, can you deviate from Safariland?
The short answer is YES but many people stick with the Safariland products because even though sinking $100 into a holster is expensive you get something that unless you break it in some wild adventure, it might last most of your 20yr career in Law Enforcement. There are so many products listed in the Safariland catalog that many dealers of the Safariland product line don’t even list all of it. Recently we actually had an issue with some of the technical info not being up to date and we had some incorrect holsters come in. We didn’t know that there was no difference between the M6 flashlight and the TLR-1S light. Everyone and their dog is using the TLR lights now so we are stocking them for the local departments.
Blackhawk Serpa holsters are still very popular and a quick fix for anyone looking for a retention holsters but I don’t even have to ask why when a cop walks in our store on why he wants retention. You gotta have retention and Safariland holsters like the ALS are the way to go because when you have to holster your weapon and cuff someone you don’t want them pulling your own firearm and using against you. The Stats are there for cops being killed with their own weapons and even for swat teams that are primarily using AR15 or M16, you need retention on your handguns to prevent them from flying out when you are moving around.