crebralfix
member
- Joined
- Mar 7, 2004
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- 1,356
Here's a sad article:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/08/AR2008070802907.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/08/AR2008070802907.html
Now that District residents can legally keep handguns, prospective gun dealers will need creative ways to target them. Based on my survey of gun shops nationwide, I suggest they start with a catchy name.
A name can reflect a state of mind or an ideology. Take, for instance, Gunslinger in Oak Lawn, Ill., or Ready On The Right in Kailua, Hawaii. Or you might choose to convey the threat implicit in the merchandise, with a name such as Ready Aim Fire in Bristol, Pa., or Smoking Barrels Guns in Lutz, Fla.
Then again, if you're aiming for a younger clientele, playful-sounding names might work better, such as Guns 4 U in West Plains, Mo., or Guns N Stuff in Bloomington, Ill.
The point is not just to kill the competition, but, as any good marketer will tell you, also create a need in the consumer where none existed before.
A good motto helps -- for instance, the one Don Davis uses at Don's Guns and Galleries in Indianapolis: "It's better to own a gun and not need it than to need a gun and not own it." Sounds good--even if people who own guns are more likely to need one for suicide than self-defense, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
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In striking down the District's 33-year ban on handguns, the U.S. Supreme Court did nothing to disturb the idea that the Second Amendment protects the right to keep and bear arms, at least in part, as a safeguard against federal tyranny. Yet even as District officials rework the city's gun laws to comply with the recent Supreme Court ruling, legislation is pending in Congress -- a federal body in which the city has no real vote -- to restrict the city's ability to regulate firearms.
The savvy gun dealer could cash in on the irony by opening the Colonial Militia Store and offering "revolutionary arms" at a discount. Motto: Ballot or Bullet? You have no choice in D.C.
The Supreme Court held that the people have the right to bear guns for private purposes, not all of which were spelled out. But you have to figure that in Georgetown, one of those purposes would be keeping the peace. For years, Georgetown residents have complained about the costumed hoards that show up on Halloween and cause a drunken ruckus after spilling out of bars around Wisconsin and M streets NW.
Now, if they had an establishment along the lines of, say, the Beverly Hills Gun Club -- which, by the way, offers its own designer apparel -- they could take matters into their own hands. A Georgetown Gun Club could feature pearl-handled, diamond-studded pistols that fire silver bullets. Motto: Defend yourself against Dracula -- put a hollow point in your Halloween.
What else can the city do except go with the flow? That's what presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Barrack Obama appears to have done. Although Obama has campaigned for gun control and against gun violence, he issued a statement praising the Supreme Court for overturning the District's gun ban.
Ricochet shooting like that might even inspire a specialty gun shop all its own. Call it Shot in the Foot or, to capture the sentiment of betrayal expressed by some Obama supporters: shot in the back.
During the Supreme Court deliberations, members of Congress signed petitions calling for the District's handgun ban to be overturned. They deserve a gun shop of their own. So let them have it: the Hamilton and Burr, perhaps. Motto: Why talk 'em to death when you can leave 'em bleeding on the floor?
In a culture that loves the faceoff, the showdown, the high-noon drama --at home and abroad -- there is no reason that D.C. residents should be denied such an essential tool for conflict resolution.
If Grenada, Miss., can have the Grenada Gold N Gun Exchange, then the District ought to have the Federal Gold and Gun Reserve. If Inglewood, Calif., can have Crispus Attucks National Gun (named for one of five people killed in the Boston Massacre in 1770), then the District should have Nat Turner's Guns N Ammo (named for the leader of the Virginia slave revolt in 1831).
If New London, Wis., can have Bare Arms, then the District can have Cold Dead Hands. Come to think of it, with 80 percent of the homicides in the District being caused by guns, you might even be able to franchise that one.
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