Another OC * WalMart * Greeter Story - this time in Parkesburg

[urbanamish99]

Tonight we stopped in at WM for some formula for the baby. It was about 11 p.m., and the kids were tired, so they stayed in the truck with my wife, and I went in to buy the baby formula.

I decided to carry 'sterile' (wallet w/ DL and LTCF stayed in truck, only took in cash to pay for baby food). I've OC'd at this WM before, and never got any comments. I was carrying a Sig P220 in a Blackhawk Serpa retention holster.

As I walked in the door, past the greeter, I heard her say "Excuse me, excuse me" so I turned to look at her, and she said "Is that a GUN?" I resisted the urge to smart off to her, and smiled, responding in the affirmative. She said "No one can carry guns in here, you're not allowed to have that in here." I told her that I'd like to check with a manager, since I had carried many times before here, and I had never had any trouble.

At this point, she got up off of her chair, and walked over the the first cashier, and asked her if she thinks I can walk around with a gun like that. The cashier was very dramatic, OH NO, NO ONE can carry a gun, just like, you know, like that, out there on their hip, yadada, and made such a fuss the next cashier came over too. Now I was standing there, waiting on a manager with three very excited WM employees yammering on about how CRAZY I must be to think I could walk around in public carrying a gun like that. They mentioned several times that "usually, when someone is carrying a gun like that, the cops just come in and arrest them".

I decided I had had about enough stupidity for one night, and informed them that I would wait outside to talk to the manager. I was very careful to not run afoul of any 'trespass' laws, and listened carefully for any demands to leave, which were not directly made, so I felt comfortable standing outside waiting for the manager.

After about 5 minutes, the manager came outside, along with a loss prevention employee, and greeted me, somewhat apologetically. He asked me if I had a permit for my gun, so I informed him that I did have a LTCF, but that I didn't have it with me, since none is required for open carry, only for carry in a vehicle, and concealing. He stated that I am welcome to carry my gun in the store, if I have a permit. I shrugged, and offered to go to my truck to get my LTCF, and show it to him, if that was the policy at his store. He said that would be fine, so I went to my truck and retrieved my wallet. I showed him my LTCF briefly, and he seemed satisfied.

I was somewhat surprised that he didn't ask me to cover up at this point, but he never mentioned it. I followed him and the LP guy into the store, and heard him tell the greeter and cashiers that "he's okay, he's okay..." I went back, got the baby food, went through the checkout and headed out. I politely smiled at the greeter, and wished her a good night, and she returned the niceties.



- I understand that the purist would not have shown the manager the LTCF, and would not have continued to shop there after being hassled. Mitigating factors for me were the tired toddlers, hungry infant, tired wife, nowhere to get baby food at 11 pm within 20 miles, etc. I was in no way going to go anywhere without my gun, and I wasn't going to go home without baby food, so I did what I had to do. The whole thing put me out of 10 minutes of time, which a small price to pay to promote the exercise of our rights. Also, the price I had to pay by showing my LTCF was very small considering the serious smugness I felt as I walked past the 'knotted panty' cashiers and busybody greeter after the manager welcomed me into the store.

[truecrimson]

Sounds like you did fine to me. We all have to weigh our personal circumstances and potential outcomes when deciding what course of action to take during a potentially negative encounter.

AFAIK it is not Wal Mart policy to require an LTCF to carry in their stores. I was not asked for one in either of my two Wal Mart incidents. You might give them a call and ask them to double check that for themselves.

[YBNORMAL]

Like you said, you probably didnt have to show your ltcf, but sounds like you did pretty good. Did you have your recorder on you? Even if I'm "sterile", I make it a point to have that on me at least. And some flyers.

And did you make sure to go to the line that the uninformed cashier was working at?

[FNG19]

Originally Posted by urbanamish99

I understand that the purist would not have shown the manager the LTCF, and would not have continued to shop there after being hassled. Mitigating factors for me were ...

... irrelevant to the conversation. I know I'm about to catch flak for this, but it doesn't matter what the purists would do. It matters what you would -- and did -- do. Personally, I think you handled it correctly, while fully acknowledging that there are other ways to handle it correctly, too. You were appropriately conservative in your reaction to the situation, and you followed up with management. Management gave you a reasonable way to defuse the situation to the satisfaction of everyone involved, considering that they did not know the law chapter and verse like folks here do. You complied with that reasonable request, which defused the situation and let everyone walk away happy. All in all, I'd say it was a real world win, even if it wasn't a Movement win (though it can be argued that reasonable interactions with gun owners go a long way to help us out!).

The only way it could get better? Write a letter to the store manager giving the manager and LP staff you interacted with props for handling the situation in a reasonable and amiable manner, particularly considering it was "the late shift". Then, take the opportunity to provide some information about how things work in PA with respect to OC (no "permit" required except in a car, etc) in a friendly way "to avoid confusion in the future" or somesuch.

Overall, good job. If you choose to draft a letter and would like to have someone look at it prior to sending, feel free to post it here or PM me. I'm happy to help out!

ETA: If you choose to write them, TrueCrimson's suggestion is a good one. I would state what you believe WalMart corporate policy to be, but invite them to confirm that for themselves. Failing to comply with both state law and corporate policy is an uncomfortable place for a store manager to be!

[urbanamish99]

Originally Posted by YBNORMAL

Did you have your recorder on you?

And some flyers.

And did you make sure to go to the line that the uninformed cashier was working at?

Several fails on my part.

My iPhone w/ voice recorder was in the car, playing classical music that was putting the kids to sleep, so I left it playing in the car, so I didn't have a VR on me.

My flyers I just printed out were sitting on my desk a work

I tried to check out at one of the lines that were staffed by the uninformed cashiers, but they were both closed by the time I got back to the front. It was the two Speedy Checkouts right by the entrance (20 items or less). The first checkout that was open was #8, so I went there. They were still at there stations when I walked up, I saw the lights were off, but I still walked up, and asked them if they are open at this register. The one guy shot me a wicked look and told me that they're closed, I need to head down to #8.

[GunLawyer001]

Sounds like it went reasonably well.

Every gun owner is an ambassador to the non-gun-owning public. The public mostly sees guns in the news when something bad has happened. Guns are only a plot element when something bad happens, and a character strapping on a gun in a movie or TV show is ALWAYS either a bad guy, or a cop/P.I./CIA agent.

There are just not enough iconic role models on display for the average citizen to wrap his head around the idea that open carry by the little people is OK. The law is what it is, making people comfortable with it is entirely different.

Sadly, the societal comparisons are gays and blacks. Getting a law passed (which is comparable to a bunch of people suddenly noticing that OC is legal) doesn't automatically make it fine for the general public, and IT'S NOT THEIR FAULT. Remember that, the culture has an inertia of its own, the vast majority of Americans (including most of you here, up until a year or 3 back) believed that carrying guns openly is wrong, unless you're a cop. Most of them still believe it. You can either walk around with a chip on your shoulder, waiting for someone to fall into your trap, or you can do what the OP did here, which is accommodate a reasonable request to demonstrate that you're not a thug (part of that is the LTCF document, part of it is not acting like a thug.)

Ambassadors have to swallow a certain amount of crap to do their jobs. They can't say "Moammar, you prick, what the Hell's wrong with you?", even if Moammar just did something terribly, terribly wrong. Not if they want to achieve their greater goals. So you can either try to make everyone who didn't get the "O.C. is legal" memo feel small and stupid, or you can follow urbanamish99's example and get what you want by being courteous and understanding.

Plus, you can get a boatload of rep points out of the deal, I just bumped him from 18 to 25, and I'd expect to see that go up. (When I get enough rep points, I'm trading them in for a toaster.)

[urbanamish99]

Thanks for the kind words. I'm planning to draft a letter to management this morning.

Would you recommend going first to the store manager for clarification, then working your way up the chain to corporate if the store manager response is unsatisfactory, or go straight to corporate, and hopefully receive a response that will rectify the inconsistencies at the local level?

Thanks for the rep points as well. I just posted my 50th post, which means I get to have 'rep power'. Now I have to go read the sticky on the rep system, to figure out how the heck it works. I have over 1600 rep points, but my rep power is 26. Like I said, I'll go read the sticky and figure it out... I don't want to go off topic here.

When I have a rough draft, I'll post it here for feedback. Thanks

[98XJRC]

nice work handleing the situation. I know that many stand by the fact that they can open carry without a LTCF. However while this is true, sometimes the best way to handle it is to infact show your LTCF and countinue to remind them that it is legal to OC. Just my two cents

[Asterix909]

Originally Posted by urbanamish99

At this point, she got up off of her chair, and walked over the the first cashier, [...snip...] the next cashier came over too.

The most shocking part of this story is the fact that your walmart had more than one cashier on duty!
lucky...

[urbanamish99]

Originally Posted by Asterix909

The most shocking part of this story is the fact that your walmart had more than one cashier on duty!
lucky...

Yes, you're right, that is shocking. I've been in this WM before that I've had to wait for 15 minutes to pay for something, which annoys me. It seems the worst is on a Friday night, between 8 pm and 11 pm. Somehow, this is frequently when we discover we are out of pampers, or some such necessity.