Walmart, what the heck?

[Critter]

I tried looking online for a new rifle and they have little or nothing on the website anymore.  I knew they were cutting back on some of the stores but not all.  Are we still going to be able to go in and order guns from them?

[backstrap]

yes u can if the walmart you talking about still sales guns they have a special order book behind the counter thay will let u look at but if u do this u have to put half down on the rifle

[RickC.]

I actually JUST got back from a trip to two Walmarts to try to order a .30-06 Handi.  Was told by both that their cutoff date for selling firearms was Jan 31st, and they could take the order but it "might not" be delivered.

 What a thing to say to a customer!! And the fact that different people at two different stores said exactly the same thing tells me that's the mantra from the 1000 stores that will no longer sell guns, and that they just don't want to fool with it.

 Disappointing, the first store I went to is where I ordered my .30-30 Handi 2 years ago.


               Rick

[skifastchad]

Walmart is just trying to compete with Target.  New Target stores are being built in the upscale liberal suburbs all the time.  Walmart is losing a lot of customers with their low-society image.  Getting rid of guns is just one way to get more liberals back in the store.

I am lucky enough to have a huge Gander Mountain store nearby.  Their list price on the handi rifle line is about 5% more than walmart's price, but they have been good about matching the walmart price if i just ask.  They have never charged me upfront for a special order gun, and they usually can get any gun in 3 days.  On top of that, they completely cleaned my new handi before I took it home.

The people at my local walmart sporting goods desk don't know anything about guns.  I would not trust them to custom order a daisy bb gun.

[backstrap]

Rick that must be 1 of the stores thats quiting the sales of firearms i have a walmart agbout 40 miles from me that all they sale now is bb guns and centerfire ammo i can drive 55 miles to the other walmart and order and gun out there from remingtons to rugers  but the closer store use to sell longguns the stores that are geting out of saleing guns u cant order guns there any more but the ones that still sale guns WILL let u order guns

[Cookiemann]

My wife works at Walmart.  It may not have hit all the stores, yet, but they are completely doing away with their 'Lay Away" program.  On Everything.  Since that is how you order guns, if you don't see it on the rack, then I would not expect you will be able to "Special Order" it. 
Yep, looks like they have gone "Liberal" on us.  Hey, I can see discontinuing sales of guns in stores that don't sell many, but to do away with special orders at the ones that are still allowed to carry guns, well, that just doesn't seem like good business.  I will be ordering my guns through Gander, as they are close and there are no Mom n Pop operations near by.

cookie

[Countryboy]

I talked with the sporting goods manager at the local WM and he said all stores will stop selling guns they just have different dates at each store. This one is late March. O well, more money for the little man.

[ihuntbucks]

The WM in my town is also stopping gun sales.Last of March,that's it.Also are closing the pet dept. sales(fish,ect.) and the one that bothers my wife....no more fabric sales.P*ss off is an under statement ...............Rick

[nomosendero]

Walmart is just trying to compete with Target.  New Target stores are being built in the upscale liberal suburbs all the time.  Walmart is losing a lot of customers with their low-society image.  Getting rid of guns is just one way to get more liberals back in the store.

I am lucky enough to have a huge Gander Mountain store nearby.  Their list price on the handi rifle line is about 5% more than walmart's price, but they have been good about matching the walmart price if i just ask.  They have never charged me upfront for a special order gun, and they usually can get any gun in 3 days.  On top of that, they completely cleaned my new handi before I took it home.

The people at my local walmart sporting goods desk don't know anything about guns.  I would not trust them to custom order a daisy bb gun.

Skifastchad, I have heard the same thing, amazing. BTW, I know this is not your view, but you are stating what some of the "new" WM team are saying & in their Liberal world, what they are "feeling". Let's look at this, shall we.

(1) WM IS the number one retailer in the world & Target is not close, we know that. So logic would dictate that you look at how you got to this level & remember those people who got you there & the things you did to secure those customers.  Well, the "new enlightened" ones are not
mindful of those people or what was done to have them as customers, basically they forgot who brought them to the dance.
(2) Yes, then after you have done that you can make plans for obtaining more business & securing other sectors of the market. But, one does not have to be done at the expense of the other. Target does not build stores in towns of 5,00 people like WM has done all over the country. If WM wanted to build stores in cities close to Target stores & set them up like a Target, fine. But it defies logic to try to change the small town WM into a little yuppie store. They could have had both type stores if they wanted to, & it is debateable that they even needed to do this. No, this is not logic, but Liberals are anything but logical people. Their agenda overrides common sense.

When I was a kid, Sears ruled. Do they now? No, & it will take longer because WM is so huge, but anyone can eventually go down if you want to run a suicide course. As one manager told me a few days ago (cannot tell where to protect him), he told me that the folks he reports to at the home office now are Libs, homos or both. The old guys are gone & he should have already left, but would have to put up with it a little longer.
And this runs much deeper than guns, one by one various services that people have appreciated over the years are going away. As for me, the more they take away, the less I buy from them. If more will do that, I know who will tire first.

[McLernon]

It's the same thing that happened in Canada more than ten years ago. The cost of liability insurance against theft and anti-gun sentiment just drove sporting goods retailers out of the gun business. Then came the long gun registry that drove up the cost of sales still further. Now I have to drive 20 miles to the next town to buy ammo or guns of any kind and the selection is poor. Bullets, cases and reloading equipment I have to get mail-order from across the country or from the U.S.A. which costs me extra shipping and brokerage fees and takes for ever.

McLernon

[Norseman112]

They used to have guns where I live but, a few months ago they quit carrying them.

John

[lost.in.indiana]

I've got to chime in on the lay-away bit at Wal-Mart.  I just ordered two new Handi's at my local Wal-Mart - whether or not they will come in is another story you can read on my other post, but I ordered them nonetheless, without a problem.  One of the managers was in the sporting goods department checking out a customer with another gun (they have to verify serial number, paperwork, etc), and so the process was easier.  She helped out a lot.

The bottom line is that Wal-Mart still has layaway, just not for everything.  They have layaway for special order jewelry and special order firearms.  The jewelry department has a layaway terminal, and while I was at my local store, they were talking about moving one of the extra layaway terminals to the sporting goods department.

Just my observations.  Nobody mentioned anything about "you better get 'em while you can."

I think that a good bit of the confusion around what to do now that "layaway's gone" is that the employees haven't been told what to do.  Had that manager not been in the sporting goods department, I probably would have been told "you can't order guns anymore, we don't have layaway."  I am almost certain of this, because both of the employees admitted that I was the first to special order a gun since the layaway system went away, and they didn't know how to deal with it.

[cbourbeau32]

I will check in our local Walmart (southeastern Oklahoma) and report back later on what they tell me. Charlie

[wtroger]

1. I have been told that Walmart will quit firearms sales as of March 31.
2. The new CEO of Walmart came from Target. And he did the same thing over there got rid of the Layaway's  fabric etc etc now that he is gone from Traget they  once again have Layways.
3. And yes my lovely bride of 37 years is mad as H*** over the Fabric section going away.
4. You know Sears at one time was the Number one retailer and they mangaged to fall from that position becuase they wouldn't sell what the customer wanted the way the customer wanted to buy it.
5. Some of the new employee policies they have and are going to implement are definitely sweat shop tactics. If you are off three days sick in a year regardless of circumstances (I.E. hospitalized) your are fired. There will no longer be set shifts if they only need you for 2 hrs then you will be sent home but are subject to being called in again and if you don't come back guess what fired again.
6. I try to avoid Walmart like the plague. They are trying to set national policy (I.E. gun control, Environmental issues) through there stores. Yet they imported over 22 billion dollars worth of goods from Communist China last year Where environmental controls are non-existant and the products are built by slave labor. And how many American jobs did that cost.   

[pfettig]

most importantly, will any of their in-stock guns be sold off real cheap to get rid of the inventory?

[quickdtoo]

Nope, their past practice has been to send the guns to other strores that are still selling them. The only guns, or any product for that matter, they discount are closeout models such as last year when they were selling Nikon Buckmasters for $80 or less cuz they were the old model, that was a heck of a deal for those of us with good timing!!

Tim

[Cookiemann]

Sorry Tim, you may be wrong on the discounts, at least at some stores.  I visited a local shop in Wappapello, MO. in October when I was visiting my folks.  He told me that he had nearly no gun sales except his most loyal customers, when the Walmart in Poplar Bluff, MOl., about 30miles away started to receive the guns coming out of the California stores that had discontinued gun sales.  That store marked a lot of stuff down below his cost and they went like hotcakes.
This may not be the case in all the towns where gun sales will be continued, but it was in that town. 

[SwampThing762]

I am going to tell y'all what my local WM sporting goods manager told me.  He said there were many reasons, some of which aree listed here, but one very major reason is not stated here.  There is a major wrongful death lawsuit in the process against WalMart.  The mgr told me that a customer came in and bought a gun for hunting, accidentally shot his kid, and then shot himself in his grief.   The widow is now suing WalMart because they legally sold the firearm.  I have not found any corroboration, but with enough money, anything can be kept off the radar.    JUst take it for what it is worth....what a WM manager told me.    It just means I will have to go to small gun shops and Bass Pro.  We have no Ganders or Cabela's in Florida.

ST762

[RickC.]

Went to a THIRD Walmart today, the one suggested to me by the other two I went to last night.

Asked the Sporting Goods guys if their store still special ordered guns.  He told me that they would not be selling guns after Jan 31, but that sure, he'd be glad to do it.  So, I showed him the .30-06 synthetic handy in the book and off we walked to Layaway.

 Layaway manager asks me if I understand I have to put down 50%, etc., etc., everything looks good.

 When they go to ring it up, it comes up "Sale Not Allowed".  Twice.

 I give up on them, that's obviously what they want.


              Rick

[quickdtoo]

Cookie, that's old business, California WMs lost their gun sales in 2004, this is not their current and recent practice according to bluebayou, our resident GBO WM manager, firearms are shipped to other stores. 

Tim

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2005/walmart_ca_gun_laws.html

[quickdtoo]

Rick, Walmarts here have already done away with their layaway program, I would venture to say that it's a regional thing and not all are on the same schedule. When I talked to the SG manager a month ago at the closest store, she showed me the firearms special order catalogs and said she would be handling the transaction at her terminal which places the order just as it was done in layaway before. Of course, if your store is one of those that got the axe, they wouldn't know the difference.

Tim

[cbourbeau32]

I spoke to the lady in our local walmart sporting goods department and she told me that the top 600 stores would continue to sell firearms. I hope this is true because she told me that our walmart is in the to 300 so if this is true we are 300+ to the good. Charlie

[kennyd]

Sounds like reading the political wind to me.  With the new congress, everyone is supposed to fall in line.  My bet is another ugly gun ban (assault), hi cap ban, ammo ban, waiting period and on.  You do realize that middle aged and older white males are dinosaurs?  That is what most of us are.  There are fewer opportunities to hunt in this urban jungle where I live, traffic makes going anywhere a pain.  I am down to elk, maybe deer, and the scarce antelope, with a small game for an odd grouse or so.  Most of my shooting is now at the range, and the city will probably take that too in a few years.

[bluebayou]

I am a manager at Wal-Mart.  The company line is that X number of stores will continue to sell firearms.  It is supposedly based on sales and our policy of "Store of the Community".  Regardless of what people are hearing from their local stores NO ONE has Layaway in their stores.  You can continue to use the Layaway system to special order firearms.  It generates a purchase order at the respective wholesaler (Lipseys. Sports South, etc).  You can also still special order jewelry and class rings if you care. 

I was surprised to hear that a small store a few miles away will not be selling firearms this year.  I was very surprised that a newly relocated and expanded store close by, New Boston TX, was going to discontinue guns too.  The party line is that sales are sales.  Store of the Community means that each store will sell what is the most beneficial for that community (according to Wal-Mart).  If they can make more money by converting the floor space to a "Bass Fishing" trait instead of a "Firearms" trait then they will. 

That being said.  My personal opinion is that the executives at my company were hired from the outside and have no history/appreciation/understanding of Wal-Mart culture.  They strike me as snobby, liberal, urban outsiders who look down upon the country hicks and urban poor who shop at our stores.  My personal theory is that they are embarrassed to shop at Wal-Mart.  In the past 3 years we have seen "upscale" clothing and appliances, "Targety" furniture and domestic goods, eliminating firearms, and now eliminating the Fabrics department.  This group of people have never lived in rural America and don't understand that we buy guns and make quilts and clothes and curtains or our families do.  IT PISSES ME OFF THAT WE AS A COMPANY ARE TRYING TO IMITATE OUR NEAREST COMPETITOR, TARGET, WHICH DOES 1/100th OF THE BUSINESS.  Why, in the crap would you want to be more like Target if Target sucks?  It looks nice in their stores?  They are trendier?  Their customers aren't poor?

Just to dispute some facts though:

Lee Scott, CEO of Wal-Mart Stores, was never an executive a Target to my knowledge.  But, I believe that he is from California 

In the past 3 years that Lee Scott has been in charge, the company stock has dropped 25%.  It has dropped every year.  We had the first flat or negative years too. 

Swampthing, your story about Wal-Mart being sued sounds apocryphal to me.

WTRoger, I don't know where you are getting your info, but that is a load of crap.  You are allowed 3 absences in a 6 month period before the "coaching" process begins.  This does not count hospitalization of yourself or a family member (try that where you work).  Also, if you come to work and are not needed you MUST be paid at least 4 hours of pay (more in some states) and you can not be called back in. 

-----Most people should quit reading now---

So Wal-Mart is setting "national policy" like what?  Wal-Mart didn't sell all of our jobs away.  That has been happening for years.  I have said this before:  America brought light to world.  Literally, the world has electricity and cell phones and clean water because of America.  America and the Soviets stopped the Nazis and the Japanese.  The world, including China, is a better place because of us.  Would you rather that they were living in the stone age?  Guess what?  American companies BEFORE Wal-Mart imported goods.  These other countries just want a piece of the pie that we made.  Our country is in denial about what to do.  Is it easy to blame Wal-Mart?  Sure.  It is Wal-Mart's fault that Mom and Dad's store went out of business and I got laid off from the mill and I can't buy an American made television.  Chevrolet made cars in Mexico in the 70's, everyone made eletronics in Japan, how about rifle scopes?  Got a Japanese made scope anywhere (because they are "better") what about a Swiss watch?  Or a German tool?  We started outsourcing manufacturing at the end of WWII because conquered people and destroyed countries wanted our money.  AND IT WAS THE RIGHT THING TO DO.  Does the world a whole hate us?  Yes.  Are they as shortsighted and forgetful as the majority of Americans?  Yes.  Are millions of Muslims a real threat to our country?  Yes.  Everyone needs to quit blaming Wal-Mart.  Wal-Mart is an symptom, not the disease.  Don't want cheap laundry detergent or cheap socks?  Buy them elsewhere.  Don't shop at Wal-Mart, but don't go around blaming Wal-Mart for God know what.  Americans did the right thing by dragging the world into the 20th Century.  Americans also shot themselves in the foot by wanting everything now and everything cheaper. 

I don't know everything.  I have a place to work.  It is better than most that I have seen.  Do I agree with our health care?  No.  Do I agree with some of our purchasing?  No.  Do you agree with everything where you work?  If you do, then I am glad.  I have two kids under age 5.  I had brain surgery and shoulder surgery within the same year.  Who gave me a job being a gimp with 2 kids in rural Arkansas?  Wal-Mart.  I don't owe Wal-Mart one thing, they pay me and I bust my hump every day because that is what my parents, the Church, and the Army taught me.  But, no Mom and Pop companies wanted to give me a job wh

en I was hurt and my kids needed things.  "oh, that's awful"  "no kidding" "oh, you're over-qualified" "i need to a place to live and food, lady"  Now that I am healed up, I can work where I want.  I want to work at Wal-Mart because there isn't anywhere else to work in the rural South where I can make the money that I do.

[OR-E-Gun Bill]

  Well said BlueBayou.

[quickdtoo]

Very, very well said!! Thank you!!

Tim

[Jack Ryan]

I hope Mao-Mart burns in heck and their political hacks aiding and abetting them in the de constructing of this country burn with them.

http://www.pacificviews.org/weblog/archives/000714.html

[Sourdough]

Here is Alaska things are differant, our Wal-Mart said they will continue to sell guns.  If they stop they will probably go the way JC Pennys went.  When Penny's closed their gun counter many of us told the manager we would not be back.  He laughed.  We stopped going to the store and so did our wives.  One year later the store closed.  Good ridiance.  Wal-Mart sells a lot more than Penny's did but most of us would do the same, and they would feel the pain.

[tallyho]

bluebayou, you make some excellent points. Thank you. I commend you for your loyalty and willingness to actually work. Especially as you demonstrate your choice to do so for a company which is growing as a target (pun not intended) for all kinds of attacks. It sounds to me like your choice was clear and based on your principles, and you are willing to accept the results of your choice.

And, as your story clearly demonstrates there are often many hidden aspects to complex, though often simplified, situations.

In my observation, many folks are not terribly interested in looking at, or for, the complexities when there are so many simplicities running rampant.

Not to hijack the subject, but gun-control vs the 2nd amendment is another one of those very complex issues that has been driven by simplicities for years.

[jimmymo]

I finally made it to my closest walmart (Kirksville Mo.) They've got a helluva gun rack (not just a turnstile at each end of the counter) maybe 30ft long glass front case with 40-50 guns of all flavors. Anyway I ask the kid workin if they's quittin guns an he said NO! He said they was like the 5th biggest seller of all walmarts, which i'd like to know if that's true? BlueBayou I don't know if you can get that or if you're supposed to give it out. I hope he's right which he was just a kid working there not manager or anything. I've never bought any guns from them but i'd hate to see them go (what am I gonna look at while momma's shoppin!) Anyway Walmart? Good/Bad Who knows? Last time I went into local farm store it was probably 75% china! New world boys and it's just gonna get better     Jimmy