Yes, Dick’s Sporting Goods is Still Suffering From Taking a Stand
Isa
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Remember earlier this year, when Dick’s Sporting Goods decided to personally take on gun violence and apply some “common sense gun reform” to their own firearm sales?
Yeah, it’s definitely still not going too well for them.
As you may recall, Dick’s originally announced they would stop selling the AR-15, the most popular rifle in the United States, and also lower the age required to purchase a firearm up to 21.
Then, they announced that, just to make extra-special sure that if their customers could no longer buy the AR-15s they had in stock, no one could, they actually had them destroyed.
You gotta hand it to them–they were really, really dedicated to the anti-gun publicity stunt.
Publicity they may have received, but boosted sales they certainly did not: they’ve been suffering financially ever since.
The Daily Wire explains:
“As expected, sales were impacted by the strategic decisions we made regarding the slow growth, low margin hunt and electronics businesses, which accounted for nearly half of our comp decline,” [CEO Ed] Stack said in a statement. “In addition, we experienced continued significant declines in Under Armour sales as a result of their decision to expand distribution.”
Dick’s banned sales of so-called “assault rifles” at its stores and at its sister retailer, Field & Stream. It also banned the sale of “high capacity” magazines and barred the sale of any gun to any customer under 21 years of age. At the time, the company admitted they believed the move could hurt sales, but said that they hoped the change would attract a new breed of Dick’s customer.
The anti-gun crowd must not buy a lot of sporting goods.
They also note that a declining economy certainly can’t be to blame:
It’s interesting to note that Dick’s is actually bucking the trend. Retail sales increased overall last quarter based on improved consumer confidence. The company says it plans to recalculate and remove some of it’s low-margin goods, replacing those items with more profitable products, like baseball gear.
Ouch!
You gotta hand it to them, they certainly seem very committed to their cause to take such a big bullet just to virtue signal this loudly.
Oh.
No pun intended.
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