Gun sales shoot up with coronavirus

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  • This photo of a pre-owned Glock 19X pistol is from the Facebook page of Firearms Solutions in Duncan. Photo provided by Firearms Solutions via Facebook
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OKLAHOMA CITY – Sales of firearms and ammunition have shot up in tandem with the increased threat from the coronavirus pandemic.

Fear of the unknown and a government that’s ineffective at protecting its people appear to be the motivation for the surge in gun ownership.

“People don’t know where this is headed,” said Keith Stewart, owner of Firearms Solutions in Duncan. “They’re buying guns and ammo for that ‘just in case’ moment.”

Guns sales increase “when people don’t have confidence in their government,” said one southwest Oklahoma gun store owner who preferred to remain unidentified. “They aren’t buying guns to kill the flu or a virus, they’re worried about their safety and that of their family,” he said.

When grocery stores sell out of toilet paper and food, “the last resort will be to take it from the ‘haves’,” the anonymous gun store owner said. “People have a right to protect themselves and their homes against looters.”

Sales of ammunition and firearms – “mostly rifles and pistols” – have occurred at a brisk clip, Stewart said. “It’s worse than it was during the Obama years.”

Sales to first-time gun buyers are “the most extreme I have ever seen,” said the other gun dealer. One of his suppliers reported receiving 17,000 orders on a recent Saturday. “That’s 10 days’ worth of orders in one day.”

Stewart reported similar circumstances.

Contrary to rumors, “We’re not going out of business, it just looks like it,” he said in a video posted on his Facebook page March 22. “Things are selling as fast as we can put it on the shelf or advertise it on Facebook.”

Stewart said that “on any given day” his principal supplier usually has 2,042 SKU (stock keeping unit) numbers of ammunition in stock. That number dropped to 550 recently, Stewart said. What’s left is “stuff that’s not in high demand.”

The supplier typically has 2,831 SKUs of handguns in stock, but those had plunged by two-thirds recently. The pistols remaining in the supplier’s inventory “aren’t what buyers are looking for,” Stewart said.

The Duncan gun dealer said his supplier also provides AR-15s, “but they’re all gone.” The supplier’s inventory lists 2,942 SKUs for long guns, but less than half of those models are in stock. “All that’s left are bolt-action rifles and .22s,” Stewart said.

“This is a nationwide distributor, and they’re all in the same boat,” Stewart said. There’s nothing to order.”