The Oddest FFL You've Ever Used

[jordanmills]

Are you talking about that filthy range in the old theater in Pasadena? They did business in the lobby. Some fool thought poorly poured concrete lanes were a good idea. Like shooting in a dudgeon. Smoky and dank. Went there once and you could see the rain coming through the ceiling. If you shot their target holders, you had to pay to have them repaired. Once was enough for me, never went back and hope they are gone. It was a scum hole

Tell me how you really feel...

Yeah that's the one. It used to be the only place I went. A good buddy worked there for years. From the scut I overheard, it was in bad shape because it was the only way the owner could keep any money out of his wife's hands, and he never had any available to do much fixing up on it. I don't know how hard it would have been to put some squirrel cage fans in to keep the lanes vented out though.

He sold it to an employee and some of the employee's investors a few years ago, probably ten years ago now. A while after that, my buddy had a wife and kid and realized he wasn't making enough money to make ends meet so he got a second job, and the new owner fired him as soon as he found out. It used to be the place where I spent all my gun money (which admittedly probably still didn't put me anywhere close to their top hundred customers) and I'd always try to buy through them first. But I haven't been back since then.

 

[ScottDLS]

c. 1985...Pineville Gun Shop, Pineville, NC (near Charlotte). Often when I went over there on a Saturday afternoon to get some ammo, there would be a hand lettered sign hung on the locked door "next door at pool hall, come over and ask for Eddie (Long, proprietor Bob Long's son, and same year of HS as me). After we got Eddie to open back up long enough to buy ammo, he'd take the money from the till back over to cover his losses or bar tab at the "Pool Hall'.

 

[Glenn B]

c. 1985...Pineville Gun Shop, Pineville, NC (near Charlotte). Often when I went over there on a Saturday afternoon to get some ammo, there would be a hand lettered sign hung on the locked door "next door at pool hall, come over and ask for Eddie (Long, proprietor Bob Long's son, and same year of HS as me). After we got Eddie to open back up long enough to buy ammo, he'd take the money from the till back over to cover his losses or bar tab at the "Pool Hall'.

The only way to do business - enjoying the proceeds of it.

By the way, Eddie followed the 3 L's rule in real estate and positioning your business - Location - Location - LOCATION! Next-store to a pool hall with a bar - that's a truly excellent business location! A strip joint on the other side of his business would have made it perfect.

 

[datatech2550]

Frontier Liquor & Sporting Goods in Fallon, NV.

Yes, I felt obliged to at least buy a six pack with my firearm purchase.

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[Dawico]

I can’t imagine how much guns out of a SnapOn truck cost LOL


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But you can just make payments.....

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[Dawico]

From the what? Both of them?

They both bought locally, one in TX and one in MN but same situation if memory serves.

The Snap-On van is referred to as the adult's version of the rape van. If you ever bought Snap-On tools you'd understand.

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[SQLGeek]

I've used that @pbratton guy several times. Watch out, if you go on the wrong day, his wife tries to get you help clean the garage.

 

[phathom]

A guy in Vancouver, WA. He had his shop, both for sales and gunsmithing in his attached garage. It had a separate man door with a small sign, was always locked off from the house with a security door, and had a separate security door to enter after you had came in from the garage man door. It was a pretty decent setup.

 

[DallasCMT]

For me it was the guy at the dentist office. After confirming three times that the address was correct, I walked up to the counter window and said "this may sound strange, but I'm here to pick up a firearm". The lady behind the window asked me to take a seat. There were several others in the waiting room including soccer moms and children. Seemed like an odd crowd buying guns! A few people were called up for their dental appointments before I was called. When they finally called my name, a guy came and placed the box containing my stainless 357 mag on the counter, I paid and left.


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[gdr_11]

I met a guy one time at an FFL in another state where it was required for a private party transfer. I was buying two handguns from him. The guy got there about 15 minutes early and started talking to the FFL. The store owner asked him how much I was paying for the S&W 686 and the SIG P-220; he then offered the guy $200 more if he would bump me and sell to him. What a douche! I didn’t know about it until after we left the store, otherwise I would have told him off.

 

[Vaquero]

Safeway grocery store in 1980.

 

[Sasquatch]

Fairly Honest Don's Machine Gun Parlor, in Hillsboro, Oregon. I took my CHL training through them too. He had the gunshop, his wife ran a trading post type store. Guy was, at the time, on of the few dealers who dealt in automatics in that area, and damn did he have some cool stuff on the wall!

 

[pronstar]

Fairly Honest Don's Machine Gun Parlor, in Hillsboro, Oregon. I took my CHL training through them too. He had the gunshop, his wife ran a trading post type store. Guy was, at the time, on of the few dealers who dealt in automatics in that area, and damn did he have some cool stuff on the wall!

Great name for a gun dealer


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[Texasjack]

Years ago - like 1980? - a friend was looking to buy a small revolver for his wife and someone gave us the address of a place in Bellaire that was pretty close to where we worked at the time. Three of us went over at lunch time and we nearly didn't go in, as it was a blank door that opened into a tiny room - maybe 5' x 10' - with a small chair and table in it. Nobody was there. There was a camera in the corner of the ceiling and a door in the back. Then someone told us to come in the back door, and we heard a buzzer. We entered the back door and HOLY CRAP! It was a warehouse with guns EVERYWHERE! All kinds of stuff. I remember an Uzi with a large spot light on it. (The days before LEDs and lasers.) Both of the other guys had been in the army (Vietnam vets) and both said they had never seen anything like it outside of the army. There was a really cool sniper rifle that had an electric trigger - something I've never seen anywhere else. My friend ended up buying a small .38 5-shot revolver (Rossi?). A year or so later we decided to go there to look for something and the business was gone.

In second place on my list of strange FFLs, there was a pair of gun stores - one in Spring and one in Humble - called Rebel Arms. Both stores were pretty nice and they had good prices. The guy who ran the Humble store "ran afoul of the law". There's a long and troubling history that goes with that one. What blew up and sent him to prison was a grenade sold to an HPD officer. The cop - allegedly after consuming a serious amount of alcohol - tossed the grenade with some buddies. Grenades don't work in real life like they do in the movies, and this one put some shrapnel in his shoulder. Wounded cop = automatic internal investigation, which led to an undercover buy, which led to ATF getting involved, and things went downhill rapidly from there. Was it a surprise that this was going on? Well.... let me tell you what I saw. I was looking at something at the counter when an HPD cop came in with a box. The box was filled with stuff that he said he "found". I don't remember all the items - there were some pistols, and there was a box of brass military shotgun shells. The cop said he wanted to trade for a couple of pistols on display and he took things out of the box, one by one, until the owner nodded and put a pistol on the counter. Then they repeated that until there was enough for a second pistol. Have you ever seen that? I suspect the stuff was "found" at crime scenes or confiscated from traffic stops. (I knew a lady that got stopped for speeding. Somehow the cop found out she had a pistol in her purse (in the days before CHL) and told her he'd go easy on her and just confiscate the pistol but not arrest her. She was actually grateful - as well as naïve.) The trade at Rebel was the firearm equivalent to money laundering. I think I said something to the cop like, "Gee! Where'd you get all that stuff?" I was met with a look that left no question that my input was not welcome, and then the owner jumped in and changed the subject by asking me if he could show me something further down the counter that I might be interested in. I did ride in to town on a turnip truck, but not that day, so I took the hint and minded my own damn business.