Our Story

Vision

Provide a real, No-BS tactical advantage to good people protecting themselves, their families, and our society.

Who Owns Shadow Systems?

Shadow Systems is 100% owned by father and son Richard and Trevor Roe. There are no outside investors, no private equity, and no outside capital. It is a family business built on a long tradition of military service, shooting, and a firsthand understanding of what firearms are expected to do when the stakes are high.

Richard Roe served in Vietnam as a helicopter pilot, flying more than 400 combat missions in MEDEVAC, Cobra, and light observation helicopters (LOH). He survived multiple shootdowns and was wounded by enemy fire in February 1971. Years later, he introduced Trevor to shooting at age four.

Trevor grew up competing on the USPSA circuit, trained extensively with world champion shooter Taran Butler, and in 1999 became one of the youngest Master-class Limited shooters in USPSA. While attending West Point, he won the Service Academy shooting championship three consecutive years.

After graduating, he served as a U.S. Army infantry officer with combat deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq. In Afghanistan, he conducted combat missions while embedded with the Afghan National Army, living and operating alongside Afghan soldiers in the field.

Those experiences shaped a simple view of firearm design. Too often, shooters buy a new pistol and immediately replace major components to get the performance they wanted in the first place. Shadow Systems was built around a different idea:

The features experienced shooters add later should be engineered into the firearm from the beginning.

That philosophy comes directly from years spent shooting, competing, and carrying firearms in demanding environments. Better grip geometry, recoil control, faster shot recovery, intuitive controls, and practical accuracy all matter—but only if the firearm is reliable when it counts.

After earning his MBA from SMU and spending several years in another industry, Trevor joined Shadow Systems in 2017 as CEO and employee number five. By 2022, Shadow Systems had become a top-10 producer of 9mm handguns based on publicly available ATF data. Today, the company employs more than 100 people and manufactures its firearms in a 45,000-square-foot facility in Plano, Texas.