Odd gun shops

[Cosmoline]

OK, I'm a well-known figure at local gun shops. I swing by on lunch breaks to check for deals on a semi-regular basis. In Anchorage it's Great Northern, Great Guns, Ammo King, Gun Runners, and Turpin Guns. But from time to time I'll stumble across some weird little gun store that has no yellow pages ad and only a little sign out front. I know of two or three such places in town. I go in, only to be confronted by an icy glare from the guy behind the counter. Prices are very high across the board.

WHAT is up with that? Is there something going on in these places--something illegal? How can they possibly stay in business?

 

[BlkHawk73]

ran across one like you describe a few years ago. fairly good size place but very little inventory. What was there was on the lower end of the price range, but not neccessarily junk. The whole time inside the clerk working there kapt his hand resting on the gun on his belt. (which was a P7M13). Kinda a wierd thing that I hadn't thought about since this post. Just another thing taht makes you go hmmmm...

 

[WhoKnowsWho]

There was this one hardware shop I went to once that a guy from work says he has really good prices...

So I went, bad side of town, no guns, just pictures of guns and written prices. Asked him if he had any and if these were current prices (they were really low, like under $500 for a new Beretta 92)

He said in broken english, "Don't have any now, shipment come next month, prices might be different, don't know until they get here."

When I talked to the guy at work, he said "I can't believe he doesn't have any more, last time I went, he had crates full of them"

Um... yeah, first and last time I go there, and thankfully, that guy at work was laid off last year too...

 

[Dr.Rob]

I think often times you are looking at a small retired guy's business, he's not really there to sell anything, he just keeps the business so he can buy cheap guns.

Everything in his store is for sale. including a brick of remington 22 LR's for $22 bucks, a mismatched Luger with a missing grip panel for $1000, and surprising supply of C&R rifles in good shape that he doesn't mark up too badly. Of course, he's hand picked the best from the crate and sold them to his buddies and the bayonet and oiler for that Enfeild is $100 more. An sks, however will cost you $400. You can get a real Hitleryouth armband, made in Taiwan, 3 boxes of MRE's and a small collection of kachina dolls his never seen wife wants him to unload. He offers gunsmithing services but you've never seen anything but rusted wall hanger of a winchester 94 on his vise, still in the same state of disrepair he had it in the last time you were in here.. two years ago. He uses more mustache wax than Wyatt Earp, and he's friendly enough, provided you have cash in your hand and don't really want to make small talk.