Anyone who’s ever spent an afternoon shooting at paper targets knows that it can get boring after a while.

Sportsmen have come up with all kinds of ways to alleviate this, but San Diego-based Zombie Industries has turned a conversation shared over a few beers into a zombie enthusiasts dream come true.

Less than two years ago Nicholas Iannitti and Roger Davis were with a group of friends planning a shooting and camping trip. As the night wore on Davis commented that it would be cool to have a target that bleeds.

“That set the ball in motion. For the next two weeks we searched the market for a bleeding target, but it just didn’t exist,” Iannitti said. “So we got to work on some prototypes that worked great, then made 200 units and took them to our local gun show.”

The men sold out in one day and that local gun show proved to be the launching pad into the national spotlight. Today, the company has 10 different product lines with 160 total products for sale.

In addition to the 3D “bleeding” targets, the company has a line of mutilating targets that mark florescent orange when hit as well as a wide range paper targets. The company has also innovated the use of clay skeet loaded into slots on specially designed cardboard targets. For those that require a little more excitement at the range Zombie Industries also offers “zomboom” and binary exploding compound.

Iannitti and Davis remain the driving force behind the company, but they take inspiration for improvements and new products from all directions.

“Our employees have come up with some good ideas and we’ve also reached out to our Facebook fans for suggestions. We also run a lot of ideas past our distributors and dealers to get their input as well,” Iannitti said. “We also look for ideas from TV shows/internet videos/magazines, personal shooting experiences, and various shooting competitions. We also make a conscious effort to look outside the industry for new ideas.”

The result is a line of products that is in a state of evolution that is drawing interest from even outside the zombie community.

This article appears in its entirety in Zombie Apocalypse Monthly Issue 5 and can be downloaded for free here: http://www.magcloud.com/browse/issue/456057