Sleazy Gun Stores

I'm lucky in that I have two great gun shops in my town. But, unfortunately, both have a slight element of sleazyness.

In the first, the sleaze is physical: There is so much mold in the place that I become physically ill. I'm tempted to take a case of lysol with me any time I go there, but I don't want to offend them. The people there are great to talk to and work with. That becomes a problem - I stay chat with them until I can no longer stand the mold, then it takes about an hour for me to recover.

In the second, it comes from the fact that they are also a licensed pawn shop (the only one in town, and only one of two in the county). They get some really shady customers in there, but the owner very carefully steers the shady characters to the other side of the store so that they don't bother his real customers.

Or, I could go to Wal-Mart. They still carry guns&ammo here.

Most gundealers are thieves...Predators that look to pay very low for trade ins, and then turn around and put an outrageous price on them...then wont give you a good price on the new gun..so they get you twice.

I was just at a gunshow today, and saw this very thing. I had a Kimber Tactical that I was carrying around(Just in case I saw something I had to have, or there was a guy looking for one )..a used one was going for $1150, and every dealer tole me"no, thanks" to my asking price($850)..a $300 markup isnt enough for them..

Don't even ask me about ammo prices...it was just stupid..do these guys just want to look at all their stuff, or actually sell it??

I think the online community will soon eclipse the gunshows, and they will fade away...(gunbroker, etc) and most dealers that are predators will also fade away...

1 store in a hardware store that was shut down by the owners refusal to fill out the state paperwork because the owners did not like the new state laws agaisnt straw gun buyers

2 a gun store that sells WORN out, I imply worn out by the fact guns had problems ranging from sloppy actions that would have needed a new reciever to correct, to shot out riflieng and then selling these guns at higher prices then you could get at gander mountain for a brand new gun of the make and model.

The only sleazy gun shops I have been in are pawn shops. Most bother my senitive nature. You used to go in these places and the handguns would be stacked two deep in a glass case and generally looking in pretty poor condition. I suspect the condition reflects the clientel.

There is one gun shop near me that I dislike going into, but I check it out periodically for consignment pieces. Prices are okay or slightly high, but okay. It is all the clingons that bother me as they stare at you when you walk in the door and act like you are intruding on "their" space.

Gun shops don't need to be fancy. They don't need to look like Bass Pro or Cabela's to be interesting. You pay for all those things in the form of higher prices.

I have been to only one bad gun store, it was well stocked and the prices were pretty reasonable. The first thing you see when you walk in is the display counter, and behind that were three good sized guys with their arms folded across their chest, leaning back against a counter behind them. I guess to make sure everbody sees the guns at their sides. Glaring at whomever entered the store. I looked around a little, but with those three guys leaning back against that counter glaring, I just walked out never to return.

m lucky in that I have two great gun shops in my town. But, unfortunately, both have a slight element of sleazyness.

In the first, the sleaze is physical: There is so much mold in the place that I become physically ill. I'm tempted to take a case of lysol with me any time I go there, but I don't want to offend them. The people there are great to talk to and work with. That becomes a problem - I stay chat with them until I can no longer stand the mold, then it takes about an hour for me to recover.

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Wow. Unless you are unusually sensitive to mold, you should tell them they need to clean the place up. Then if they haven't done anything within, say four to six weeks, call the health department/BBB. That's gonna get dangerous eventually, I'd bet.

This is my least favorite type of store to go in....

The ultra over priced store where when you ask to see the Taurus auto, the smug a-hole says "You don't want that... you want this!" and pulls out something three times the price. I promptly say, "That's not what I want. I wantED the Taurus. Good day."

I know they want my $ 'now' and not my business 'for years to come'.

There is one local store here that is much better than any of the other local places, at least in most areas. It's a family run place, that in the past, wasn't very friendly at all, and had only a small selection of handguns. They had a ton of used and new rifles and shotguns though. They have an indoor range, something most of the ones that are close by don't have, and at 15 bucks an hour, it's fairly reasonable.

They are really friendly now, a friend who knows the family said the attitude change took place when the father died, and the son and his wife took over.
They still have the huge load of rifles and shotguns, but now they have a great selection of handguns, both new and used. The used guns are all in great shape.

I go there to shoot, and I do buy a few odds and ends, but their priices are just nuts. I mean worse than Gander Mountain, and Cabella's are on non sale items. I looked at a new FNP-9 and the clone Browning Pro-40 last week, a gun I can buy from a ton of places for about $500, or less, brand new, and their price? $749.95. I snorted when I looked at the tag, and the woman waiting on me asked, "Too high?", I nodded and said, "Yeah, by about $250!"
I saw an EAA Witness full sizes Wonder finish, in .40, used in almost NIB shape. They wanted $550! Used. I asked her, why the crazy prices, why not make 50 bucks a gun and sell 10, instead of 1 gun and make $250 instead? She just shook her head, and said they had to get that much, "Those prices on those websites aren't real!" I opened up my case with 4 guns I bought online. My newest, a new Witness 45 was under $400, including shipping. My little Astra A-75 .40 was less than $300, in almost new condition, and both my Dan Wesson V715 and Model 15's were less than $300 each. She said, "Well, you just got lucky that they all shoot ok!"

Four out of four times is luck?

Granted owning a gunstore is a very tough business, with long hours, little profit, having to deal with unsavory customers, and alot of paper work/bookeeping. I would never want to own a gunstore. That being said, so many gunstores have lousy customer service, and many seem to have people who could care less about doing business, and treat it as a personal hobby. You would not find too many business that could remain open for long with that type of service. I have been to some good gun stores, but at least in Mass, many gun stores seem to be personal hobbies for retired men who have money to burn before they pass on or sometype of social club for the local duck hunters and/or milita types. And one wonders why so many people have a very negative opinion of gunowners since our main ambassadors are cranky old white men who smell funny, and crack biggoted jokes about minorites. God help us.

Nightcrawler: There are two types of poor gun stores I've been in:

1) The depressing little store. You know the kind. It's small, cluttered, has only a spattering of hunting rifles on the wall, and is staffed by a grouchy old guy that doesn't like talking to you unless you're one of his regulars.

2) The huge gun store. The kind that's so big and busy that you can scarcely get anyone to help you if you want to look at something.

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Or, you have Outdoor America...

Cluttered, and is owned by a grouchy old guy that doesn't like talking to you unless you're one of his regulars. Huge gun store, the kind that's so big and busy that you can scarcely get anyone to help you if you want to look at something.

This is coming from someone who worked there (and is trying to go back! ).

I rarely buy anything locally. The biggest local gun shop is run by a guy with too many opinions. I asked to see a S&W 460 once and he pulled one out and proceded to tell me it was more of a gimmick then a real gun plus his price was $200 more then online. He also doesn't mark prices on any of the guns, which bugs me. When you ask, you usually get something like "about 400". I guess that means negotiable, but it makes me wonder if the price depends on who the customer is (i.e, the naive get nailed on price).

Another place is a part time business with lousy hours and keeps most of his stock in the back so you don't really know what he has. I did buy a couple guns from the guy when I first moved here a couple years ago because I wanted to support the local guys. Subsequent to that, I asked him to do a transfer on a gun I found online and he wanted to charge me sales tax on the purchase price falsely claiming is was state law, so I found a pawn shop that was glad for easy $25. I gave him one more chance when I was looking for a K-31. He said he would get me one from a distributor, but everytime I called he said all the distributors were out. I knew that k-31s were all over the place, so I felt like the guy just didn't want to order one and didn't have the b*** to say so.
I got my C&R about 2 weeks later and had a K-31 within a week.

In the area I live, choices abound. It seems that there is an example of every shop described above. Actually they are not in the area where I live. In order to go "Shopping" we are talking a minimum of 45 miles R/T. So I chose two out of the ten to do my business. Regarding pricing, sometimes it's hit and miss. It seems that both shops are right on with the growing trends and the markup say on Kimbers is relatively high. Otherwise, both have a great selection of well maintained and respectively priced used firearms. Over the years I have built a relationship with both owners to help me get what "I" am looking for. One of the shops is a class III and this gentleman attempts to get me to get my silencer paperwork going "Everytime" I walk through his door. I am sure it is not just to get the sale, (Believe me this guy is volume driven like Costco.) But he knows that I have wanted one to go with my P-22 for a very long time and he go's out of his way to make people happy.
When I used to live in Western Washington state, I was forced to shop at the only available Monopoly up off of North I-5 (I am sure many of you know to whom I refer.) It was the most heavily armed group of grumpy old men you would ever want to immerse yourself in. But, for the most part they were the only game in town. I had no trouble taking my business 115 miles South into the lower Eastside of King County to DJ's to do my business. I bought my first handgun and rifle from them back in the eighties and everytime I return home, I try to spend a little cash in their establishment.

My favorite where-have-you-been-for-the-past-20-years line:

"No, but I can order that from a distributor.", and then quote an obscene price.

Yes, thank you, SO CAN I. There's this thing called an "internet"...

Big thumbs down for Outdoor America Store

"Or, you have Outdoor America Store ...

Cluttered, and is owned by a grouchy old guy that doesn't like talking to you unless you're one of his regulars. Huge gun store, the kind that's so big and busy that you can scarcely get anyone to help you if you want to look at something."

I ordered a Rem Choke 870 barrel from Outdoor America Store online - that was late December 2006 and the barrel sent was defective. I promptly emailed digital pictures of the defect (the barrel wasn't properly tapped & threaded for the Rem chokes, resulting in the chokes not being concentric to the bore), and was instructed to send it back which I did via UPS with tracking. Subsequent calls and emails have failed to produce a refund to my credit card. I'm ready to turn it over to my credit card company for a charge back. Buyers beware ...

There is a thrid type of store..

the store that I like to go to. Green Mountain Guns in Lakewood CO. These guys are pleasant, they stock a wide selection of guns and they are not the biggest load of crooks this side of Washington DC. They treat people right, even explaining whhy they cannot give someone $500 for the worn out .22 their granddad left em. They have a huge consignment business where on any given day, a dozen guns can come wandering through.

So, yes, there are the stores that are run as if they are tryiing to stop business and there are the warehouse style stores where no one has a clue what they are selling, but in my case, I found a good store.

The typical conversation goes like this: "I want a Ruger Redhawk."
"No you don't, you want a S&W model 29"
"I want a Savage rifle"
"No you don't, you want a Remington"
"I want a Glock"
"No you don't, you want an HK"

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You just don't understand what those people are trying to say. The translation is: "You're so stupid. You THINK you want to shop at my store, but you ACTUALLY want to shop at another store, and I want you to go there, too. I HATE getting any new customers. Idiot."

Luckily, this is still America. The owner of a store has the right to run his business any way he sees fit, provided he obeys the law, and I have the right to spend my money where I want.

The closest gun shop to my house is owned by a crotchety old man with the personality of a brick. He's been in business for decades, and is quite unlikely to change. That's fine, it's his business.

As for me, I'll drive 30 minutes over to Moore Outdoors (http://www.mooreoutdoors.biz) and spend my money there. Hey, I didn't read anywhere that I couldn't plug my friend's gun shop

I went to Potomac Arms before they closed down last year. They were my favorite gun shop.

It wasn't the neatest looking shop due to its location on the waterfront in Alexandria, but they had the best customer service and the nicest clerks in the whole DC area. Pleasant clerks in general are something I find to be rather rare in this area (or maybe it's just me...)

They were also mindful of who came into the store...

I too have a story of three gun shops somewhat in my area, Select-Fire in AA county is about the worst shop that I have been to period, they normally have little to nothing in there, they also have a crappy little range that seems like is a great burdon to let anyone use, strange rules and don't even ask to look at a gun unless you plop money down first, if you don't either "you can't afford it", or "you want that one over there, not this one", every once in a while I stop by to see if they have cleaned up, but to no avail.
The second shop, incidentally I found after being absolutely frustrated by the first is On Target in jessup, this is a great shop, tons of pistols and revolvers, a few AR's and SKS's and CQ shot guns, a couple parts, mostly tailored to defensive and LEO products and is often full of off duty LEO's and military from fort meade across the street. the staff will spend as much time as you could possibly need to help you and they have a fairly nice range, and a large amount of rental guns so you can often try it before you buy it.
the third is the proverbial good ol boys hunting shop, Gun Shack in mt.Airy, they are some of the most helpful and nicest people you will ever meet, old plank floors, cast iron stove, and at least a couple hundred hunting/plinking/classic military rifles, and a couple pistols, they will order just about anything and have a decent selection of reloading equipment, they have tons of consignment and used guns, mostly in great shape and if you ask for help or have a question be prepared to spend some time and take some notes, this shop has been in buisness for something around 50 years and alot of their regular customers will jump in and tell you anything you would ever want to know.

. . . still America

Luckily, this is still America

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Da.

In Russia, you stand in line outside in cold, then you take vhateffer ve giff you, and you are happy vid dat. If Boris tell you iz guud, you take. Enuff vid dis nonsense. Freedom uff choice?! Bah! Vhere you tink you are? Amerika?

A good gun shop is where I go for recreational shopping. I will by small.
Big ammo orders are online. A gun may be purchased once in a while.

There is a really friendly one in Morrison, Illinois (a bit of a drive from where we live, but a fun drive) that is full of crap to look at; Exner's Sportsmans Paradise. Nice folks who encourage 'looking around'. I always find something to buy.

The worst one (IMHO) I won't name, but it is in Cook Co. just outside of Chicago. It may be closed down by now. They were overpriced, un-friendly, and had many lurkers in the parking lot asking for straw purchases. Low rent.