It�s not all that often that I carry a gun into a strip mall. Then again, this isn�t your ordinary suburban strip mall�
That�s because sitting next to Walgreens, in the same storefront that you�d expect to find a Hallmark or AT&T store, is a shooting range. No, the display cases aren�t filled with cell phones; they�re filled with handguns. And behind the (presumably bulletproof) glass are 16 lanes of climate-controlled shooting stations.
The location isn�t the only thing that doesn�t fit stereotypes. For some, the customers may be just as surprising�
There�s the lady in her early �30s putting holes in the paper �bad guy� target 25 feet away � she�d never shot a gun before setting up in the lane next to me. Neither had the couple who rented a pistol to try for fun on a Wednesday evening�
Not everyone there was new to firing a gun. The corporate cowboy in a polo shirt and khakis � stopping on his way back from a day at the office � was showing up for a competitive shooting match taking place that afternoon. Don�t even try shooting here on a weekend unless you�re ready to stand around. The wait for a lane runs about an hour during peak times. In fact, you won�t find the range empty even in the middle of the workday.
�It�s like this every day,� said the range�s manager, looking tired. Clearly, business was booming a bit too much. �I mean, look around � it�s a Wednesday afternoon and this place is packed!� Around the country, the stories are pretty much the same.
Yes, the gun world is changing dramatically in 2012. While Black Friday 2011 was relatively tame by most retailers� standards, it was a banner sales day for guns. The FBI�s NICS database (which provides instant background checks for gun buyers) got nearly 130,000 hits on Black Friday, the most the database had ever received in a single day. Not much later, December set a new record for the most hits in a month. And for the full year, 2011 turned out to be a record year itself, registering more than 16.5 million hits to the NICS database, a 15% increase from 2010.
Clearly, the trend of gun buying is still accelerating at a breakneck pace. But digging a bit deeper into the demographics of who�s buying provides even more interesting results�
It turns out women are driving some of the biggest trends in gun ownership. According to a Gallup Poll from October, 23% of women personally own guns, up from just 13% in 2005. That�s a massive increase in ownership by a group that has traditionally shied away from firearms.
We likely have the media to thank, in part, for the demographic shifts that are going on in the firearms business. Gun-centric TV shows such as Top Shot and Sons of Guns are giving publicity to gun ownership for recreation and protection. At the same time, guns are becoming a less politicized topic: While Republicans tend to be gun owners at a higher rate than Democrats, Democratic gun ownership has spiked in the last decade. Today, 40% of Democrat or left-leaning households own at least one firearm, the highest level in a decade.
That�s not to say that politics aren�t still central to the gun business. With an election year well under way, the National Rifle Association is already actively railing against the Obama administration. While it seems unlikely that a candidate on either side would tighten gun restrictions given the current pro-gun climate, the political message is still likely to do quite a bit to fuel the gun-buying fires this year.
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