Wal-Mart is bringing guns and ammo back to many stores. Sales are up, and Wal-Mart is in the business of making money. But remember, the US gun industry is in decline, and they could prove it too if they just had access to all this information NSSF and NRA aren’t hiding.
UPDATE: ARs in Wal-Mart too.
Never quit selling them around here, in fact the Lock Haven, State College, and Clearfield WalMarts also sell re-loading supplies. Altho selection is limited what they do have is cheaper than the same stuff at any local gun shop.
They just started with the reloading stuff a few years ago.
I date myself, But I can remember when Sears sold firearms. Their is finical trouble, I wonder if they will consider that marketing strategy? I love seeing pictures of black rifles in Walmarts gun cases. It gives a new standard for Common use firearms!
Zermoid: There was a period where they in theory pulled back a bit, e.g. they were going to close the Joplin, MO #1 store’s section (where there’s stiff competition from an Academy Sports next door plus at least one very good old fashioned gun store on the other side of town) but leave ones in surrounding communities open. As it turns out the only really disgruntled Wal-Mart employee I’ve ever talked to was a 7 year veteran who was facing a layoff due to that … but as it turned out, they didn’t close it.
Wal-Mart is very data driven (they and Amazon.com got into a non-compete legal fight when the latter hired some of their programmers (California is the only state in the nation where they aren’t enforcable, which has more than a little to do with Silicon Valley’s long term success; for all that the area and state sucks, you can’t compete with the most liquid market for human talent in the world)). So if they’re doing this, they’ve got data that says it’s going to make them money.
BTW, black rifles have been sighted at some Wal-Mart stores as of late.
As for the “policy” they adopted at the behest of MAIG, and seeing as they’re catching a lot of flak from it from many gun owners for it, I’ve seen Walmart’s current firearms sales procedures manual, and they didn’t actually follow through with it besides some of the actual “no shit, every FFL does that, and Walmart has always done that” things on the list. (Check ID’s, video surveillance in sales area, quarterly inventories.)
I actually went through MAIG’s list one by one and compared it to Walmart’s current firearms sales SOP a while back when people were getting all upset over it on a forum a while back, I might do it again and keep it somewhere for posterity.
The local wal-mart dropped their FFL I beleive around 7 years ago. And the new ones that have opened I know about don’t have it. They don’t even have a sporting goods deparment. I guess it wasn’t profitable to them. But they kept everything gun related including ammo. They were considereing dropping that as well until obama was selected to be president by wall st. I would buy from the local store but its a 30 mile roundtrip by car. I can literlly walk to the wal-mart and back.
They still have that 6 box maximum policy and while the shelves are no longer bare the rotation is still quite fast. They never have a lot of handgun ammo.
I guess I got the “scoop” first before Time magazine…
http://godgalsgunsgrub.blogspot.com/2011/10/just-like-good-ol-days.html
Dann in Ohio
I thought I had heard of this before. Turns out I blogged about it too, but a bit after you:
http://www.pagunblog.com/2011/11/29/walmart-selling-ar-15s/
Out here in the country where we live, Walmart not selling guns is like Ford not selling cars… You can also buy guns at the local Ace Hardware store and the Town and Country Department Store… in addition to the local gun dealers’ shops…
Dann in Ohio
Years ago (mid-90’s) I bought a S&W at a Sports Authority *inside* Philadelphia city limits. Until recently I could go to just about any Wal Mart just outside the city and buy ammo for a trip to the range. Ah…. The gool ‘ol days…..
Markie Marxist sez: “I’m cool with that. We can gull gun owners into thinking that everything is fine for gun owners just long enough to get Comrade President Obama re-elected, and then comes the crackdown! Ha! Ha! All your Wal-Mart are belong to us! Gun sales on, gun sales off – just like flipping a switch. Ha! Ha!”
Yeah, that link update is a local newspaper for me. He’s already caught hell in the comments section for all of the lies and mistakes in the article.
It’s my local paper as well. The comments have been interesting. I love the comment on his Henry rifle being “that damned Yankee rifle” that never needs reloading.
John Boyle has never let facts get in the way of a good story.
They are indeed; the only argument I saw missing (and couldn’t add because I don’t do Facebook) is that with AR-15 derived rifles being standard US military issue for half a century any intimation they’re exotic is … well, the usual product of often willful ignorance. How many Americans have at minimum been exposed to them in basic training by now?