Albertson's Companies reject open carry after Mom's Demand pressured them

[DesertRat]

BREAKING: After @MomsDemand put pressure on them, another major American retailer has rejected open carry. Albertson’s Companies has more than 2,200 stores under the brands Safeway, Acme Markets, Haggen Jewel-Osco, Lucky Pavilions, Plated Randalls, Shaw's, Tom Thumb and Vons.

Link to tweet

AlbertsonsCompanies: We see our grocery stores as a hub in local communities & we're proud to serve our neighbors. We want our stores to feel safe & welcoming for all, so we respectfully ask customers to not openly carry firearms in our stores unless they are authorized law enforcement officers.

[sheshe2]

1. Excellent

[marybourg]

2. Good! I've only seen someone

carrying a firearm in a local supermarket once in the 26 years I’ve lived in AZ. I immediately left the store, and my cart, and told a cashier why on the way out, and I don’t ever want to have to do that again.

[DesertRat]

17. I've it seen a few times here in AZ

Most recently at a convenience store in Payson. It’s always an unsettling feeling.

[Hekate]

3. Progress!

[MontanaMama]

4. So is "respectfully asking" customers

to not openly carry firearms in their stores the same as not allowing it? I believe gun nuts won’t respect a polite request and do it anyway. That’s why we call them gun nuts.

ETA: I do want to recognize that this is, in fact, progress!

[stopdiggin]

8. expect it works like this

patron is approached by staff and is respectfully explained store "policy." Polite request to secure firearm in vehicle before returning to shop as valued customer. If staff receives push-back on request, it is referred on up to management and security. Management then explains that if patron does not comply with request they are violating established store policy and will at that point be considered "trespassing" on premises, at which point Law Enforcement may be engaged. In short .. they can MAKE this work, if they so chose. And they WILL .. if a large portion of their customers makes it clear that is what they WANT.

[Meadowoak]

14. In my neck of the woods, if mgmt asked someone to put their gun in the car,

They would probably get shot.

[stopdiggin]

16. price 'a doin' business?

seriously though .. I hear ya brother. Been there.

[Meadowoak]

18. Needless to say, I don't leave home anymore than I absolutely.have to.

[vsrazdem]

20. Well, they they should just do what they do to most minorities, call the cops first, and ask

questions later.

[Turbineguy]

23. By putting in the word

"respectfully" they acknowledge that gun nuts are delicate flowers.

[Meadowoak]

5. Carrying a side iron seems to be a status thing here in KY.

You see people carrying guns everywhere.

[Hoyt]

6. Kind of like wearing a MAGA hat.

[Meadowoak]

7. Yep!

[smirkymonkey]

9. To me it just screams insecurity.

Only weak, pathetic, frightened people need to carry a gun with them everywhere to prove their doubtful masculinity. And women doing it are just as sad. These people need psychiatric help, not guns.

[erronis]

28. Don't forget that these are status symbols. I spent lots of $$s on my big pistol.

And in consequence, trying to take that "big pistol" from them is like trying to take away their identify, their masculinity.

Make me think of a lot of trash ATVs, snowmobiles, other "have to have" items in people's yards. Spent money, used a few times, and then trash. Same as spending money on muscle cars and firearms.

Gotta have it to look like a big bubba. OK, now I'm a big bubba but I'm broke and further behind. Maybe dump can make me alright again.

[wasupaloopa]

19. When I was a kid I went to the local bar with my dad. It was ok there to be under 21.

My dad had a relative from Kentucky along one time. When the relative sat down at the bar he put his gun on the bar to in front of him.

He was asked to put it away and I don’t remember if he did. This was in Dayton Ohio.

[Wellstone ruled]

10. Oh how this will leave a mark.

Talked to a Albertson Front End Manager on Thursday about this issue. Yes,she said,people have left the store when there has been someone carrying a weapon also in the store. And she has had several shoppers just plain get in her face about this issue.

So folks are becoming more aware of their Surroundings even while Grocery Shopping.

[Scurrilous]

11. K&R

[Grins]

12. Better...

“...we respectfully ask customers to not openly OR CONCEAL carry firearms in our stores unless they are authorized law enforcement officers.”

[cannabis_flower]

29. Conceal carry

Is going to be harder to ban. After all, it's concealed, unless they pull it out you aren't going to know they have it. Not saying they should be able to carry it, just saying how would you know?

[bucolic_frolic]

13. Food retailers terrified

that customers will abandon their shopping carts wherever they are and exit pronto!

The labor to reshelve and spoilage would really add up!

[Turbineguy]

24. In the end it comes down to money.

The real cost of being a gun-based society.

[bucolic_frolic]

25. Haven't seen a dollar total on

treating all the victims, lifelong care and fear, burials for the deceased. Usually money gets the Republicans all upset, but no one is totaling the cost of all this carnage. It's not like it's accretive to GDP.

[Turbineguy]

26. I ran some numbers a few years ago.

The real cost of a gun would come out to about $60,000.

Of course, that was during the Obama admin when gun sales were high.

[bucolic_frolic]

27. 60 grand to treat a gunshot?

I think you're off by maybe a factor of 4, 5, or 6?

Or are you estimating the total adverse costs and dividing that by the number of guns in America?

[Turbineguy]

31. Total annual adverse cost

divided by the number of guns sold.

[patphil]

15. You could make a good case for anyone openly carrying a gun in public as being mentally ill.

And thus not to be trusted with any guns at all.

[stopdiggin]

21. Hmmmm .. Maybe here on DU. Other places?

laughed out of town. more seriously .. let's be careful about labeling people mentally ill?

[patphil]

33. I don't think it's a laughing matter. Too many dead bodies.

It's not normal behavior to carry a gun on you hip as if this was the wild west.
If people see someone with a gun inside a store, how do they know it's not the prelude to a mass shooting?
Openly carrying a gun in public is a deliberate provocation; meant to frighten and intimidate everyone who see that person.
That is not the action of a mentally balanced person.
And, I do believe there are a whole lot of people outside of DU who agree with me.
Probably a majority of all Americans.

Patrick Phillips

[stopdiggin]

34. your concern for open carry and public safety

are 100% on target, and laudable. Your insistence on labeling a particular segment of society as mentally ill (with little evidence other than you don't approve their behavior) is, I think, indefensible. Do you think you would be able to get very many psychiatrists to go along with your broad brush diagnosis?

[patphil]

35. No. I wouldn't.

It's my opinion.
As far as I'm concerned, the whole national obsession with guns is a sign of deep rooted psychological issues on the part of millions of people who get angry at even the suggestion that their right to bear arms be curtailed in any way.
Open carry is their act of in-your-face defiance.
Given the climate of gun related terrorist acts in this country, it doesn't seem to me that a sane, responsible person would want to play on the fears of other citizens by carrying a gun in public.
So, I do think that there are a lot of people out there who exhibit symptoms of mental illness by deliberately intimidating others with their actions.
They know the fear that has been created by the situation in this country, and they do it anyway.
So, to answer you, I don't approve of their behavior, and, in my opinion, it is a sign of mental illness on their part.

Patrick Phillips

[lunatica]

22. Well who magically knows it the person isn't a mass killer?

Just this issue alone should make businesses ban guns in stores.

Then there’s the possibility of someone calling the police and the police shoot the gun toting customer before he goes on a mass shooting massacre. It’s not like they’re not uncommon anymore.

Open carry is the stupidest policy in today’s reality. Everyone is already nervous about the daily mass shootings as it is.

[Thomas Hurt]

30. Bringing a firearm onto someone's property without permission...

is threatening and dangerous. You would think that the so called champions of freedom and property ownership would understand this....but nnaaaw.

[dalton99a]

36. +1. From Houston Police:

Can I openly carry or concealed carry on private property?

Yes, provided that the property does not display the signs described in Section 30.06 and Section 30.07 of the Texas Penal Code at each of its entrances. Regardless of whether any signage is present, however, if the owner or manager asks you to remove the weapon or leave the property, you must comply. Failure to leave the property when requested to do so could result in you being charged with criminal trespass.

If I am asked to leave a store for openly carrying a weapon, can I cover up the gun and go back in the store if I have a license to carry a handgun?

Yes, if the store does not also prohibit concealed carry, unless the store owner or manager asked you not to return, in which case returning would constitute a criminal trespass.

If I am a private business owner but I do not have the proper 30.06 and 30.07 signs posted and I ask someone who is carrying a weapon to leave my property, are they legally required to leave even though I don’t have the proper signs?

Yes. As a private business owner you can tell someone to leave if they are carrying a weapon whether or not you have the proper signs posted.

http://www.houstontx.gov/police/open_carry/

[magicarpet]

32. Does my side arm make my dick look bigger,...

.... or should I get an AR-15 assault rifle to help accentuate its size ?