Sportsman's Warehouse impressions

[NcongruNt]

So I finally bit the bullet after waiting interminable months for this company to finally get inventory up online (which still hasn't happened, despite the website claiming that it is "coming soon" since at least November), and made a trip up to Round Rock to see what this place was all about. I also was needed to get a hunting license and set up a hunter education course, so it was a good excuse to go.

First, the positives:

The gun counter guys are very friendly and will talk with you in their experiences with particular guns. This impressed me coming from a chain store. They had their inventory readily accessible and would happily hand you anything you wanted to handle and try the trigger on.

The guy at the license counter was helpful and was happy to go and look up course details for me.

Now the negatives:

This store doesn't like to carry affordable anything.

I went over to the carry ammo section to see what was available. I went specifically to find 9mm 124gr. +P GDHP ammo, only to find that they simply didn't carry it. This surprised me, as this seems to be a very common carry round, and is the standard 9mm service round used by many police departments. It's not that they were out... there wasn't even a place on the shelf for it. So I figured that I'd maybe try some federal... but they had nothing in a 124/125gr. +P round. In fact, the only +P round they carried in this weight of bullet was Remington Golden Sabre, which doesn't really seem like an attractive round to me. I went looking for some S&B ammo for both my Mosin-Nagant (7.62x54R) and my PA-63 (9x18). When I failed to find any of these, I looked the shelves over and realized that they don't carry S&B ammo AT ALL.

Disappointed, I went over to look at the reloading section. My disappointment did not end there. I have been preparing to get a Lee Anniversary Kit, so I figured I'd check out what they have. They do not carry Lee reloading equipment at all. The only equipment available was Hornady and RCBS.

I figured I'd at least get a magazine for my Hi-Power, so walked over to the gun counter and asked if they carried the Mec-Gar 15-round flush magazines. They do not. In fact they don't carry Mec-Gar mags at all. This really made no sense to me because Mec-Gar is known to make high-quality mags. Apparently they're not expensive enough for this company to bother selling.

My impression with this place is that they have somewhat of a captive audience in their suburban locations, with customers who either don't want to bother traveling to a real gun shop or don't know any better and buy what's put in front of them. Their prices seem steep, and in many cases are nearly MSRP (such as the Garmin 60Cs GPSr I looked at). While the staff is friendly, the company itself seems intent on only selling items for which they glean a hefty profit margin from ignorant customers. While I will return for my hunter's education course, I'm not going back as a customer.

[KD5NRH]

They do not carry Lee reloading equipment at all. The only equipment available was Hornady and RCBS.

What is the deal with smaller stores carrying RCBS but not Lee? Around here, it's nearly impossible to get Lee gear, but everybody's got RCBS everything. I don't care how much some people love them, I'm not paying $18 for a primer pocket brush.

RCBS: leading the industry in costing three times as much as comparable equipment.

[WillieD]

I am jealous that you have one down there as they just closed the one up here in Lewisville. For the month of January they had everything on clearance from 10-50% off, and I spent way too much money. Before they closed down it was one of my favorite stores to go look around in, and I even purchased 3 guns from them in the last year.

[Rokyudai]

I never seem to hit the right time to purchase ammo there. It's a sad song every time. I ask them when they will be getting new ammo in, they never know or just don't want to find out. "It's just popular ammo". Here's a tip (to Sportsman's Warehouse), order more the next time if you constantly run out!

[stroo]

I am surprised they didn't carry any Lee reloading equipment. The store in Lewisville always had some usually including an Anniversary kit. Of course now they don't carry anything.

[The Annoyed Man]

I lament the passing of the Lewisville store. I bought two rifles and a pistol, plus a Leica CRF1200 range finder from them over the past year. The gun guys were friendly and helpful, and their gun prices seemed VERY affordable. I never had much trouble with ammo from them either, except that their Federal .308 168 grain SMKs were not always in stock, and their 5.56/.223 stock was spotty. Other than that, I miss the store.

[bpet]

I too liked the store. Too bad the Lewisville store closed.

Not sure why. I guess Round Rock just has more "sportsmen".

[pfgrone]

I've purchased a couple of handguns and a bit of ammo from Sportsman's Warehouse and found their prices and service ok but their ammo selection is always fairly spotty.

BUT, look around, it is a Sporting Goods store trying to cover numerous interests related to hunting, fishing, clothing, camping, etc. It is not a specialized Gun Store. For the type of store it is, I think it does a reasonably ok job. I just get a tad frustrated because they don't do trades on guns and ammo selection is much more limited than I would like it to be.

[stroo]

I was told the Lewisville store went under because they did central purchasing out of their headquarters in Utah. So they bought stuff that would sell well in the northern states and didn't really buy goods that were fit for Texas. So they always had a lot of inventory that did not sell.

[texagun]

Which Lewisville store went out of business?

Is it the one at I-35E and Hebron?

[DoubleJ]

yes, the one in Lewisville. between Target and Circuit City, across the street from Raising Cane's.

[O6nop]

The one in Round Rock usually has good prices on powder. The only other place that sells it that I know of is Cabelas, at least around Austin.
Sportsman's Warehouse hasn't stocked up on reloading bullets or primers for a while. I thought I saw a Lee Anniversary Kit in a box on the top shelf above the dies, last week when I was there, but none on display.

I've bought three handguns from them, but probably could have gotten better deals if I looked around.

[Keith B]

Which Lewisville store went out of business?

Is it the one at I-35E and Hebron?

Yes. It was the only one in the DFW area. I really liked it too.

[lrb111]

I went over to look at the reloading section. My disappointment did not end there. I have been preparing to get a Lee Anniversary Kit, so I figured I'd check out what they have. They do not carry Lee reloading equipment at all. The only equipment available was Hornady and RCBS.

I got my Lee stuff from http://wideners.com/itemview.cfm?dir=210|212|237 , I can recommend them.