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For most of us, Sunday is the day of rest. But for many gun dealers, it’s a big day of profits. Should you be open on Sunday? Perhaps. What is right for your shop depends on the strategy of your store and the customs of your particular community.
I travel a lot and I try to hit different gun shops, largely to get a sense of what’s moving best and where, as I gather material for the readers of this column. Recently, a road trip took me up Interstate 57 in Illinois, beginning at Cairo on the state’s southern border and finishing in the northern part of the state, in Chicago.
I couldn’t help but notice that every shop I found on the southern portion of I-57 was closed on Sunday. That’s the more rural part of this heartland state.
Things were different in the north. Chicago, of course, bans gun shops within its city limits. However, as soon as you hit the suburbs, you find a span of fine firearm emporiums that encircle Chi-town, and manage to flourish, despite the oppressive anti-gun political atmosphere of Cook County. And nearly every one of the gun shops is open on Sunday.
GAT Guns in Dundee, Ill., is a vast, two-story building that was originally an upscale restaurant. Greg Tropino, already a gun shop owner at the time, bought the 27,000-square-foot building in 1989.
A sign at the front door proudly announces that the store is closed only on New Year’s Day, Memorial Day, Easter, July 4, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas. Yes, GAT is open on Sundays.
GAT has 38 employees, 30 of them in sales; that’s a lot of salaries to pay, which means a lot of guns to sell. With about 5,000 in stock and well over 1,000 of them on display, selling a lot of guns is what GAT does.
“Being open Sundays is important to us,” said general manager Randy Potter.
“Sunday is generally our second heaviest day of the week for customer traffic and for sales. Only Saturday usually beats it for volume.”
While Illinois has no concealed carry option, at this time, the high-crime Chicago area is full of armed households. Unless grandfathered in back in the ’70s, Chicago residents cannot have handguns in their homes, so they buy shotguns. Outside the city limits, handguns are the choice for home defense.
“We sell about 70-percent handguns, 16-percent rifles and 14-percent shotguns,” Tropino said.
The store’s location in Kane County, clear of Cook County and its “assault weapons ban,” helps Tropino move a large selection of “black rifles,” including a wide spectrum of AR15s. Personal and family protection drive these sales, far more than hunting or competitive target shooting.
The open doors on Sunday also allow for special events.
“Once a year we have a Saturday, Sunday Winter Sales Spectacular, where we offer special discounts and bring in manufacturers’ reps to display their wares,” Potter said. “At our last one, we were bringing in 3,500 people per day. Fourteen employees were dedicated just to writing up sales, with customers enduring a one-hour wait in line.” |
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The density of an area’s population greatly influences whether gun shops are open on Sunday. In more rural parts of Illinois, a small-town gun shop is more or less readily accessible to those who live in the town and its immediate environs. Customers can get to the shop during a lunch hour or after work, and it’s not hard to get an hour off the job to pick up a firearm.
In a metropolis such as Chicago, a city dweller, who has to deal with heavy traffic, may need an hour or even more one way to get to his or her favorite gun shop. This makes a run to the gun shop a “destination trip,” the sort of thing best accomplished on a day off from work. Therefore, the dealer who wants this customer’s business likely will open on Sunday.
Look also at what could be called “patterns of everyday life and culture” in your particular community. I can best illustrate this with the example of a small town in the Deep South that is home to three gun shops, two operated full time as the owners’ primary occupation. None were open on Sunday. Why?
It’s in the Bible Belt. There are fewer than 7,000 people who live in town, perhaps 35,000 in the whole county. There are over 100 houses of worship. Sunday really is the day of rest. It is a day for church and family. There’s a 24/7 Wal-Mart SuperStore near the highway. It’s packed on Saturday, but on Sunday, it has fewer customers than on a weekday.
Another key element in the “open on Sunday or not” debate is whether your establishment is a gun shop or a range-and-gun shop combination. I found, in Chicago and elsewhere, that dedicated firearm retailers who are open on Sunday tend to also have a shooting range on the premises. A “let’s go shooting” excursion is definitely a destination trip, thus, it makes sense to be open on the generally universal “days off.” |
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Should you operate your gun shop on Sunday? If you’re already open on Sunday, you already know, based on the bottom line, whether you should continue.
If you’re considering opening on Sunday, you need to know whether there’s enough potential business on the day to justify the time, salaries, etc. Begin by surveying your present customers. Would they like to see you open on Sunday? Do they know potential customers who would become your new customers if you were open on Sunday? If no other gun shops in your area are open on Sunday, that could be a good — or bad — indicator depending on, again, the customs and buying habits of your locality.
If you do open on Sunday, begin advertising the fact well in advance. You can do all the right things, but unless all those potential customers know about it, your chances of success are greatly reduced.
You’ll need to commit to working Sundays for a couple of months, as the word spreads. Among gun owners, word-of-mouth often trumps advertising. After two months, you likely know if opening on Sunday was a good idea.
Only you truly know your turf. It’s obviously your decision. However, many gun dealers, particularly those with shooting ranges as part of their complex, have found that Sunday is more a day of profit than a day of rest.
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