The new Savage Stance marks Savage Arms entry into the popular concealed carry, polymer framed, striker-fired handgun market. For starters, lets get the usual factory specifications out of the way.

SKU Number 67010

The Savage Stance is an attractive little pistol, and appears to be both reliable and well-made. The Stance comes nicely presented in a lockable plastic box. There are a whopping 14 models of the Stance to choose from. The tested example is the “Stance Grey Manual Safety Night Sights” version. Despite the good build quality and well-done grips, the Savage Stance has a couple of critical flaws that make it impossible for me to recommend it. The ambidextrous manual safety doesn't have nearly enough purchase to make it easy, much less instantaneous to get off.

The stopper on the Savage Stance is the miserably poor trigger. It is heavy, breaking at 6-1/2 pounds or so, but far worse is the long take-up, full of grit and false stops. This makes the Stance quite difficult to shoot well: it isn't a pleasant experience. By comparison, the recently reviewed Mossberg MC2sc nails it, with a 4.1 pound super-crisp trigger, an outstandingly good 14+1 round capacity, and the bonus of being optics-ready. The Mossberg has their version of the Glock safe-action trigger safety, meaning no external manual safety needed or required.

I am disappointed, to say the least. It is ironic that Savage Arms, who revolutionized the bolt action rifle industry with the Accu-Trigger, could stuff it up so very badly with the Stance trigger, although the rest of the pistol shows good promise.