Gun sales go BOOM

Some say Democrats at the helm have gun owners ‘hunkering down’

By Nick Peterson And Stover E. Harger Iii

The Beaverton Valley Times, Oct 15, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (1 Reader comment)

Jaime Valdez / The Times

The Tri-County Gun Club has a number of shooting ranges on its 230-acre property near Sherwood. George Pitts, the club’s public information officer, says that membership in the club has grown an average of 70 members a month in the past year.

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John Lennon’s observation that happiness is a warm gun may be more true now than ever if membership at the Tri-County Gun Club is any indication.

The club has picked up an average of 70 new members a month through most of this year, according to George Pitts, Tri-County’s public information officer. The credit for that spike in membership falls on the Barack Obama administration, Pitts says.

“We took in 77 new members this month,” Pitts said on a sunny afternoon last April, as sporadic gunfire echoed through the hills of the 230-acre club nestled in the hills between Tualatin and Sherwood. “Since Obama’s become president, membership has just grown like crazy.”

Earlier this month, Pitts said the inflow of new members hasn’t slowed down throughout the year. Membership is right around 4,000.

“I think this last month we took in 55 or 60 new members, but that’s probably the lowest this year,” he said. Typically, before the 2008 presidential election, the club would gain about 30 new members a month.

Know your gun rights:

The Tri-County Gun Club Web site — www.tcgc.org — has a link to the National Rifle Association Institute for Legislative Action and urges members to “stay involved to keep your rights.”

“If you want to keep your right of self-defense, you must be politically active,” the site says. “Politicians pay attention to loud voters in large numbers. If you do nothing, the gun control people win. This includes reminding the NRA and other pro-gun organizations that gun registration is a non-negotiable item.”

So, the Obama administration worries gun owners?

“I think there’s an aspect to that,” Pitts said. “I think the political concerns are pretty fresh in everybody’s minds. They don’t know where this administration is going.”

Many gun owners are “hunkering down,” according to Pitts.

“I think there’s a real concern there. People are doing two things: One – they’re personally stockpiling. The other is, a little hoarding – thinking that they can make a buck.”

Gun sales up

The local reaction to the Obama administration’s perceived attitude about gun control mirrors the national trend.

Smith & Wesson, one of the largest manufacturers of firearms in the United States, announced recently that its sales were up more than 30 percent from the previous year.

That was reflected in local firearm sales which have also been up, according to local gun and gun accessory dealers.

Sales of assault rifles and other types of firearms skyrocketed after Obama’s election – and despite slowing down somewhat in the last few months – business is still going strong at The Gun Broker in Tigard.

Chalk it up to fear of gun rights being taken away, but also an influx of new products on the market and concerns about home invasions in the current economy, said Gun Broker salesman Greg Apple.

“People kind of freaked out,” Apple said about the post-election rush to buy guns and ammunition. “That’s kind of mellowed down a bit.”

It’s nearly impossible to find certain types of ammunition, particularly for handguns, these days, according to Mark Wiprud, who runs the online gun dealership Jack the Dog from Beaverton.

He said he saw gun sales drastically rise after the election, but also drop now that people have realized that Obama has not yet broached the topic.

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