Americans Buy Guns in Record Numbers for Christmas
'Tis the season to be jolly.'
Well according to the FBI, this Christmas season provided a lot of jolliness to gun enthusiasts.
Over 1.5 million background checks on customers were requested by gun dealers to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System in December. What's even crazier with these numbers is how much these gun purchasers are procrastinators. Nearly 500,000 of those requests were just within six days of Christmas.
It was the highest number ever in a single month, eclipsing the previous record set in November. So it looks like it is safe (or unsafe) to say that 2011 was a year for the guns.
On December 23 along there were 102,222 background checks, making it the second busiest single day for buying guns in U.S. history.
Let's not forget that these are JUST background checks, meaning that at the very minimum, one gun was sold for each check, while that does not figure into individual customers bringing home more than one firearm.
Many believe that due to the halted economy, people are preparing for crime waves to sweep the nation, therefore guns are being purchased rampantly. This summer before the Occupy Wall Street protests, Wealth Wire reported the highest selling items on Amazon.com were crowd control and protest-ready weapons such as batons and baseball bats.
Other theories as to why buyers are cleaning the shelves of gun stores is because they believe tighter firearms laws will be introduced in the near future. So to make sure they are prepared for the projected law changes, people are buying in hoards.
On a different level, some just attribute the high gun sales in some creative marketing. There has been reports of certain gun clubs offering pictures with Santa, a very interesting yet effective technique.
According to The National Rifle Association, people are mostly concerned with self defense police officer numbers are continuing to fall.
NRA spokesperson says, “I think there's an increased realization that when something bad occurs it's going to be between them and the criminal.”
From The Telegraph,
But anti-gun campaigners said those who already owned weapons were simply hoarding more of them due to "fear-mongering" by the NRA.
A spokeswoman for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence said: "The research we've seen indicates fewer and fewer people are owning more and more guns."
In states like Arizona, home to the tragic killing of six and near-fatal shooting of congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, citizens are calling for tighter gun control, but according to one local gun dealer, sales couldn't be better. Legendary Guns in Phoenix had 25% higher sales on Christmas and the owner describes ammunition sales as “brisk”.
“A lot of people are concerned about pending gun legislation and the sense about the current administration. People think future availability will be limited and there's a feeling of 'get it while you can.'”
News 
Market Data 
Discover 
