doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com strange policy at Cabela's

Location, location, location is the reason for Dicks decisions. They have many stores in locations which long gun demand is very, very low. Their one market plan fits all stores, has never worked well. Like having almost all freshwater fishing supplies when the store is ten mile or less from the Atlantic Ocean and 99% of demand is for saltwater fishing equipment. Or having long guns in a urban or suburban area with almost no interest in them. And people who want guns will hit the internet to find them, not walk into Dicks and look around.

Then on top of that guns and ammo are very low margin lines. If your 10-25% line is not selling, giving you few inventory turnovers a year, you can not afford to let money just sit there not earning you a return. So you reduce your guns and add more clothes which have twice or more the margin. Plus you can merchandise a 100 square foot area in clothes for a few hundred dollars investment where in gun that might be thousands of dollars. And clothes give you four plus turn overs a year, at a higher margin, than guns which will struggle to turn over once or twice a year at a very thin margin. Bottom line is that you can make a lot more money on clothes than guns. If that was not the case the clothes in Cabella's would be gone and the guns everywhere.