Another wave of customers, both new and old, is flooding gun stores across the country in the wake of the 2020 election. While Joe Biden and his anti-gun co-horts were denied the solid Congressional majority that they were expecting, which is going to make his gun and magazine ban an iffy proposition in the near future, Biden’s already making plans to use executive and administrative actions to target legal gun owners. As a result, gun stores are just as busy now as they were in the weeks before the election.
“It’s just, it’s been crazy and every week its getting worse,” said Chris Harding, owner of H&H Tactical in Exeter.
For a Sunday afternoon, business was steady at H&H Tactical.
Harding tells us nearly 60 percent of his customer base are first time gun buyers, as ammo continues to remain a hot commodity, especially given the heated political climate.
“They’re buying anything they can get their hands on. High capacity magazines, guns, ammo anything that they’re calling assault weapons A year ago, before all this started we would roughly sell 2,000 rounds a month. Now we’re selling between 50 to 70 thousand rounds a week,” said Harding.
H&H Tactical is located in northeastern PA, but the continued boom in gun and ammo sales isn’t limited to one region of the country. From southern California to Nebraska’s panhandle, folks are lining up to try to get at least a little of whatever’s in stock.
John Erickson at Flatwater Arms said business in Bridgeport is thriving beyond seasonal buys, like waterfowl guns.“Oh, my goodness, this year’s been tremendous, it’s hard to keep things resupplied,” he said.
He offers gun-smithing and cleaning services,concealed carry classes and other hunting and fishing gear to offset the down periods in gun and ammo sales, but 2020 is the exception, where gun sales ticked up during March, and haven’t slackened.Erickson, who’s run the shop since 2014 said a lot of first-timers have signed up for concealed carry classes and purchased guns at the shop.
“Just last month, I had four people sign up for the class, never owned firearms, never owned ammunition before, brand new,” he said. “I was able to get 240 rounds of 9mm for them, but I had to pay street price, more than twice as expensive.”
Join the conversation as a VIP Member