Dick’s Sporting Goods Bans Assault-Style Guns

Daniel Ukkelberg March 5, 2018 No Comments

The nation’s largest sporting goods retailer, Dick’s Sporting Goods, is banning sales of assault-style guns in all of it’s stores after the shooting in Parkland, Florida.

CEO Ed Stack was influenced to stop these sales because he said that the shooter in Parkland obtained a shotgun at one of the company’s locations in November. Though the shooter did not use the gun in the shooting, it led Stack to take action.

“We did everything by the book,” Stack said. “We did everything that the law required and still he was able to buy a gun. When we looked at that, we said, ‘The systems that are in place across the board just aren’t effective enough to keep us from selling someone a gun like that.'”

The decision was announced with an open letter and Stack on “Good Morning America,” along with the announcement to end sales to people under the age of 21 years old and the sale of high-capacity magazines.

“As we looked at what happened down in Parkland, we were so disturbed and saddened by what happened, we felt we really needed to do something,” Stack said.

This approach has gained praise from many people in support of gun control, yet it does not take a large percentage of these guns off the market. The four largest gun sellers control only 5 percent of overall gun sales in the U.S.
Though this does not take a large percentage of guns off the market, Stack said he realizes that they will receive backlash for this decision.

“We know that this isn’t going to make everyone happy, but when we take a look at what those kids and the parents and the heroes in the school, what they did, our view was if the kids can be brave enough to organize like they this, we can be brave enough to take these out of here,” Stack said.

The company is also calling for Congress to require “universal background checks” and “ensure a complete universal database of those banned from buying firearms.”

Along with this, Dick’s Sporting Goods wants the U.S. government to ban assault-style guns throughout the nation, outlaw the sale of bump stocks and high-capacity magazines and raise the minimum age to purchase a gun to 21.

Walmart has not sold assault-style weapons since 2015, but other stores such as Cabela’s and Bass Pro shops (now the same company) have no intention of halting the sale of assault-style guns and high-capacity magazines.

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