This past weekend the Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL) held its fourth Concealed Carry Fashion Show & Expo. The last show was held in 2019 at the same venue as it was this year, Cyprian Keyes Golf Club. The fashion show was run by Kerrie Ann Auclair and Renee Gagne, DCProject delegates from Massachusetts and Rhode Island respectively.
There were nearly 120 attendees of the show and the 18 models ranged in age and body types. Three of the models were men, while the rest were women. The show opened with a cocktail hour with some delicious pulled pork and chicken, as well as a cheese and fruit plate. In the back of the room, Garet Holcome, the GOAL President, and Jeff Strider, the GOAL VP, were recording some segments for the GOAL Podcast. Holcome and Strider featured several of the models, some local instructors, and sponsors for the podcast. The show was emceed by Jim Wallace, the Executive Director of GOAL.
The models came out to some great music and strutted their stuff on the catwalk, not once, but twice during the evening. After the first round on stage, there was a short intermission where the models changed outfits and holsters. Every model took the stage walking casually down the runway, stopping, then revealed where they were carrying a blue training firearm.
There were several types of holsters, from shoulder bags, thigh holsters, inside the pants, and even a corset holster. You could tell the models were really enjoying themselves and some even hammed it up a bit.
After the second go around of models, outfits and holsters, GOAL had raffles and a door prize. There were several items donated from GOAL, The DC Project, and many vendors around the country, including Spent Rounds Designs, Bass Pro Shops, and the USCCA. Overall, there were over 30 bags where attendees could drop a raffle ticket, hoping that their number would get pulled. The prize bags had several items from targets, ear and eye protection, to pocket knives, a cigar ashtray, cooking spices, small gun safes, and even a charcuterie board with spent ammunition in the design.
The ladies running the event, Auclair and Gagne, have a lot of things going on besides the fashion show. They’re both instructors, certified through the Massachusetts State Police, the NRA, and the USCCA. They’re members of the DC Project, which brings women from around the country to visit Washington DC and show the counter to the “red shirts.” The DCP’s chosen color is teal and on their social media, they use #DoingSomething and #TealTeam2 in their posts. They also donate time to Armed Women of America by instructing women in using firearms during their monthly meetings. And if that isn’t enough, they recently started a YouTube channel called Sisters In Arms – A Firearms Story. The show is where the ladies interview folks from GOAL and some instructors in Massachusetts, but also people like Michael Sodini from Walk The Talk America. I think that yours truly may have been on an episode, too. May have…
I’ve been to a few concealed carry fashion shows around the country, from Florida to Arizona, Texas to Pennsylvania. These ladies did a wonderful job putting everything together. People were talking about how well it went off, but I do know that it was a lot of work and time.They had several sponsors for the show and there were about half a dozen businesses who set up tables as well.
What I really enjoy seeing is people embracing the carry lifestyle and celebrating it. Let’s face it, the antis don’t want us carrying, let alone making it comfortable and even stylish to do so. They don’t think we should own, let alone carry a firearm. With fashion shows growing around the country, it’s a great time to educate the armed folks about the ability to see what can’t be seen,and to keep the secret from the antis, who don’t know that we’re carrying.
