Wal-Mart Dickson City is no longer OC friendly....

[Gary in Pennsylvania]

Happend yesterday afternoon.


It was non-confrontational.....I wasn't a difficult hardass and management was, for the most part, pleasant. I did, however, take some witty shots when the conversational door was left open.

Bottom line? New management is in place…..not the same that I’ve known for the past nine years (since my oldest was born).

I was initially approached by a tall, lanky guy with earpiece communicator to boot. It was him, and the worker/helper who, I feel, was trying to come across as tough – but that’s hard being that he was restocking the poinsettias.
For those that know the DC Wal-Mart….I was in the lawn & Garden center, which is transformed into ‘Christmas World’ the day after Halloween.

Anyways – I won’t give a verbatim reenactment…..but it started right out with a statement directly out of ‘Duh-ville’.
The lanky assistant manager (I forgot his name) started the engagement with 'mime practice'. He introduced himself, I shook his hand, and he started a series of motioning/pointing/looking etc.... in an attempt to hopefully communicate his thoughts without speaking.

“I’m sorry?” He was gonna have to talk to me.



The manager began by using this zinger “Is that a functioning firearm on your hip?”
I replied “It wouldn’t be much use if it wasn’t”

The conversation began. He asked if I had a permit. I asked him for what? Though he was reeealy green (looked late 20’s?) and nervous how to handle the situation….he was able to stammer that he knew that OC, as I was doing it, didn’t require a permit…but he wanted to know if I had one.

I wouldn’t tell him. I also told him that I don’t recognize him and that he must be a new hire. Nice to meet you. He admitted that he was just hired on in August and Wal-Mart Corporate Training says firearms are not permitted in stores.
And I told him that Anand (The long-standing manager) never had a problem with my firearm, even after face-to-face conversations. And their LP guy never had a problem either – and he sees me CONSTANTLY.

This was too much for him. Dropping Anand’s name threw him through a loop. He called in backup – the Store Manager. HIS name is Stacy (I’m not making this up).

He is also new, and he was more composed, but still friendly. He tried to explain that he’s got nothing against guns and owns them himself, but he has a store policy to enforce. My choice was to either conceal it or he’d tell me to leave the property.
Meanwhile, my wife was funny through it all – she knew what was up and kept coming back to the cart and intentionally butting in with decoration questions……she had a ‘Talk-to-the-hand” demeanor towards the managers and the Silent Bob poinsettia kid. My kids were well behaved as well.

After back-and-forth conversation, I did eventually don my coat.

But the manager wasn’t done – though I met his requirement for “staying in the store”….he (Stacy) prodded me by asking “So…..what do you carry it in the open like that? So you can let everyone in Wal-Mart know you have a gun?”

That’s it. No more niceties. No offense to overweight people, but Stacey the manager is fat and the answer I gave him was less than kind using his fat belly as an example. It was a great delivery – and the explanation was the same one I’ve used repeatedly on this board – OC is a matter of 1.) Comfort 2.) Accessibility.
I explained to Stacy that a 5” XD45 Tactical is NOT a comfortable worn IWB and offered a scathing challenge of how comfortable it would be if he….with that overly large mid-section of his…… could comfortable carry this same full-size firearm IWB.

He wasn’t amused – we exchanged some further curt thoughts and I ended it by telling them that since they got what they wanted…and that’s ALL they wanted (cover up) they’re excused to go do Manager-like duties elsewhere in the store. Stacey said “Fine – just know that if I see you come in the store again carrying like that after I’ve warned you, I’ll be forced to call the DCPD and have you escorted out of the store."

“Merry Christmas, Stacy.”
With that, he, the lanky assistant, and poinsettia boy left.
I didn’t have any OC fliers.




I dunno what happened to Anand – 9 years as a Wal-Mart manager is a long time. Maybe he moved on, retired, or whatever.

Either way, Wal-Mart had ALWAYS been an OC friendly place…..no longer.

Looks like I’ll be wearing my GP-100 and untucked at Wal-Mart from now on (Stacy made it clear that if he doesn’t see it….he doesn’t care)


Reactions will likely be diverse – But my point was simply to inform you of the OC change for a local business.

[rwilson452]

Must be Walmart has changed corporate policy. The last I heard the Corporate policy was to conform to local laws. This might be worth going at again if anybody has the corporate phone number.

[gnbrotz]

Originally Posted by rwilson452

Must be Walmart has changed corporate policy. The last I heard the Corporate policy was to conform to local laws. This might be worth going at again if anybody has the corporate phone number.

For quite some time now, there has been a know caveat that regional or local management has the flexibility to set their own policy on this matter. I'd bet that what you're seeing here is a manager who has indeed done this, but is unwilling to take credit for it, choosing instead to "blame it on corporate".

If a manager wants to implement such a policy (assuming he has authority to do so), so be it. But I'd respect them a lot more if they actually had the balls to take credit for their own actions - even when we differ on principle.

[gnbrotz]

Originally Posted by Gary in Pennsylvania

Stacey said “Fine – just know that if I see you come in the store again carrying like that after I’ve warned you, I’ll be forced to call the DCPD and have you escorted out of the store."

This might be one jurisdiction where such an action might have some very interesting results. Anybody know when Gallagher and Mariano are on duty?

[Pa. Patriot]

Originally Posted by Gary in Pennsylvania

He admitted that he was just hired on in August and Wal-Mart Corporate Training says firearms are not permitted in stores....

...for employees!

Idiot.

Far as I know WM corp policy is unchanged. Send a complaint ASAP. They will allow managers to do as they please but that does not mean that a complaint will not be "heard". So to say.

[normanvin]

This did happen in the world of Dickson City afater all. The rules are different there.

[XD40coyote]

If it was me, I'd call corporate HQ and complain. If Walmart's policy is to conform to local/state laws on firearm carry matters of customers, maybe someone from corporate will remind this new manager of it, and he won't give guff to other OCers after that. Worth a try...

LOL @ the part about calling DCPD...

[Shawn.L]

Originally Posted by gnbrotz

For quite some time now, there has been a know caveat that regional or local management has the flexibility to set their own policy on this matter. I'd bet that what you're seeing here is a manager who has indeed done this, but is unwilling to take credit for it, choosing instead to "blame it on corporate".

.

Being in retail managment I see a lot of this. New managers sometimes feel they have to exert some type of authority when they first come into a store, to show their employees "whos in charge". Of course "blaming on corporate" is how a pussy compensates for this show of force. I see it a lot.

And before anyone (and I get soooo sick of this) chimes in with how "managers are stupid" or "retail workers are stupid" or "WM employees are stupid", I would just like to say that people in general are not cold and logical. They dont often think out what they are doing before they do it. They make desicions before they have all the information, and then refuse to admit when they are wrong. In general, most people are like this. It is not usually an awful thing, just a tad difficult to deal with when it is being done to you. So its not that "_____ is stupid" its that people are people, and they go into all sorts of professions. You just dont happen to interact with many of those proffesions as often as those in the service/CS industry.

[jahwarrior72]

Originally Posted by Gary in Pennsylvania

He admitted that he was just hired on in August and Wal-Mart Corporate Training says firearms are not permitted in stores.

he lies. walmart follows the laws of whatever state they're in. i'd call corporate and straighten it out.

[mjfletcher]

Ill agree with those that said call corporate. The last time I spoke with them, summer of last year, I was told that corporate policy in regards to firearms is that carry in the store by customers is permitted in what ever matter the law allows and that the local/regional managers CAN NOT alter that. Call corporate and lodge a complaint.