HOT SPRINGS, Ark. — Gun dealers and sporting goods retailers have seen a spike in ammunition sales in recent days since the escalation of stringent measures designed to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus in the United States.
"Business has been great," said Tanya Spavins, owner of Mountain Valley Armory in Hot Springs. "It's been a perfect storm."
The shelves that hold ammo at her downtown store are sparse with limited choices for certain calibers and bullet types.
The shelves are more densely packed at the larger Argeo's Wholesale Guns across town but the demand is just as strong.
"It's a lot. The last time we were this busy was probably for our fire sale," said Erin Latsha, who has co-owned Argeo's for five years, taking over soon after it burned down at another location.
Latsha pointed to a pallet of 9mm bullets that had been 80 percent depleted in just one day. A sign limiting purchases to 10 cases hangs above the display. One of the shop's workers explained to a caller how they had no bullets with full metal jackets or hollow points. Both of the shops' lines rang constantly.
"This industry is very driven by politics and by whatever's going on in the country," said Spavins when asked if fears about the virus were prompting the run on guns and ammo.
"They're concerned that there's going to be a panic that goes to the point when all the grocery stores are empty. They're thinking Venezuela," she said, describing people purchasing handguns for the first time for home defense. "They think that when all the stores are empty that people are going to start to try and break into homes."
That market for pistols comes at the same time as other pressures hit the market for established gun owners.
"Walmart has stopped selling handgun ammo," Latsha said. "And it's an election year. That's a big time for people when they hear, 'We're going to take your guns' or 'We're not going to sell this kind of ammo.' They tend to want to stock up a little bit."
These dealers say most regular customers are in good spirits. Like all retailers they hope to stay open and Latsha circled the store scrubbing down surfaces with disinfectant. Both owners hope to draw on past experience navigating previous geopolitical storms.
"This is not unusual. This will also pass," said Spavins. "It happens in election years. It happens after mass shootings. It happens when different politicians come to power. These things wax and wane."
"Everybody's joking and laughing right now," said Latsha. "We have people making jokes about how they need ammo to protect their toilet paper."