California – -(Ammoland.com)- Earlier this week, San Francisco’s last gun shop, Highbridge Arms, announced that it is closing its doors in October 2015. Here’s an excerpt from their Facebook page:
Dear friends and family, it’s with tremendous sadness and regret that I have to announce we are closing our shop. For many reasons I cannot get into at this moment, it appears our final days will be through to the end of October of 2015. We will clearance out whatever inventory we have in the shop and offer sale prices for anything you would like us to order.
For all our true friends and followers, I would like to sincerely thank you for all your support, likes, positive feedback and best of all, your friendship. Hopefully, we’ll see you soon. It has been a long and difficult ride, but a great pleasure to be you’re last San Francisco Gun shop.
Our warm regards,
High Bridge Arms
It’s no secret that San Francisco has many anti-gun politicians in the Mayor’s office, the Board of Supervisors, and former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi represents the city as well. While there has been no official comment from Highbridge Arms as to why they are closing, we can speculate that years of political pressure, an anti-gun climate in San Francisco, and anti-gun legislation and laws created a super storm making it challenging to run a gun shop in city limits.
Adding insult to injury is the incredible and dramatic increase in rent for businesses and residents over the past 6-7 years. Making ends meet for the gun shop and its employees may not have been a sustainable proposition.
As Highbridge Arms was my home gun shop, I will be very sad to see it go. There is no official word if they are relocating or simply going for good. I hope they will relocate to somewhere in the Bay Area so we can ensure that San Franciscans can exercise their Second Amendment right.
With Highbridge moving out, it will be interesting to see what will happen to legislation the San Francisco Board of Supervisors is considering which would require video taping gun and ammunition sales, and sharing ammo sales data with SFPD. My guess is that even with Highbridge closing by the time they vote on this, they will pass it in the hopes to keep any future gun shops from trying to open in the future.
It will be interesting to see if any viable lawsuits come up in the future which argue that San Francisco has a de facto gun ban since it will (soon) have zero gun shops, or something along those lines. I’m not a lawyer, but I sense potential for legal action by some organization down the line.
Anyway, thanks again to my friends at Highbridge for supporting my career and being great friends. You will truly be missed here in San Francisco, and I hope folks go visit them before the end of October when they shutter their doors.
About Chris Cheng
Learn more about Cheng at https://TopShotChris.Com and https://Facebook.Com/TopShotChris Buy his “Shoot to Win” book at tiny.cc/01m85w
You should worry about california as the laws here are the stepping stones to other states. If they can justify the laws here, they will soon be exporting them to other states one by one. We don’t live in a vacuum, laws set a precedence that can be used in any court case in the united states. Also too much of california’s population is from people that moved over from new york and have brought their idiotic gun thinking to california. The other reason california is going bad is because too many gun owners are giving up the fight and… Read more »
I really dont give a damn about the 2nd amendment rights of Californians anymore, they keep voting anti gun so just let them rot in hole they created.
COME ON DOWN TO THE GREAT STATE OF TEXAS !
WE’D LOVE TO HAVE Y’ALL .
SF politicians have somehow convinced themselves that they live in a walled city where they can control the flow of all goods and services. They can pass all the restrictive laws they want but they can’t stop someone from driving a few miles to one of the many nearby “less enlightened” cities to buy guns and ammo. So unless they erect walls and checkpoints around the city, their ignorant laws amount to less than nothing.
‘TEXAS,LIKE A WHOLE OTHER COUNTRY’ ! Damn it’s so fine !
Them ‘ole boys have a Texas flag hanging proud ! That’s where they should relocate their business,..Texas !
I hope you plan on relocating,might I suggest Georgia as a new site to relocate.We can always use hard working people who work hard and like to play hard and believe in civil rights and have had theres tromped on
Not much of a surprise. Always thought it strange there would be a gun shop in San Fagcisco.
I remember when that hag Feinstein refused to allow the battleship Iowa (not sure about the name) to be berthed there, because it had been refitted with a nuclear reactor. Then she found out that it would have been a battle group of at least 5 ships, with thousands of sailors contributing to the economy, but it was too late. The Navy just gave her the middle finger. As for Pelosi, I think she is too busy doing insider trading to be concerned about what is going on, though she swore to uphold the Constitution too. But California wants you… Read more »
It was the Battle Ship Missouri.
San fransicko has always hated anything that had to do with either guns or the military, is it any wonder that this gun shop lasted this long. When it comes down to it that city in some ways has had a soft gun ban going for some time now. They have been making it harder and harder to buy a gun there for the last decade or more. When I was in the Coast Guard there the city wanted to make people jump through all sorts of hoops just to get one back then (that was in the 80s) now… Read more »
I doubt that the closing of any or all gun shops in The Rainbow City will have any adverse effect in crimes where a gun was used or other violent crime. Rainbow City has been eliminating anything related to firearms , as you say, since the 80s and, please correct me if I am wrong, but I do not believe there has been any notable increase in violent or crime wherein a gun was used. I mean the city is really all about “brotherly love”, right? At any rate, it is a shame to see an honest working man loose… Read more »
I think you are right. I believe the city is also into “sisterly”: and other types of love as well. The absence of gun stores in the Bay Area probably will have little or not impact on violent crime in the area, simply because it is already so difficult to have a gun there when you need one. It isn’t enough to have gun stores available, it must also be possible to keep guns in the home and carry them in public, if the objective is to reduce violent crime rates. This is amply demonstrated in many other areas that… Read more »
I agree with what you stated. I just read an article showing how each state ranked with regard to FFL holders. Texas was number 1 in FFLs and number 2 in population. I LOVE Texas.
‘TEXAS,LIKE A WHOLE OTHER COUNTRY’ !
In Frisco you see them damn fag flags fly everywhere. The whole damn city could crash into the Pacific,who cares ?