Black Friday is the retail world's big day. It's the norm in America to see long lines and buying frenzies on the day after Thanksgiving -- but at gun stores?
"People started calling, asking if we were going to have Black Friday specials, and we hadn't planned for it last year, and we said 'Sure,' and we whipped something together real quick," said Peter Stefansky, Bain and Davis Gun Shop. "This year we planned for it better and business did increase."
In fact it increased more than 30 percent for the folks at the Bain and Davis Gun Shop in San Gabriel. And other gun shops have jumped on the bandwagon as well.
According to the FBI, the Black Friday weekend saw a record number of gun sales this year. The FBI did nearly 284,000 firearm background checks that day, compared to roughly 215,000 last year, up nearly 32 percent.
In fact, there were so many guns sold on the day after Thanksgiving that the FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check System experienced two outages that day.
And it's not just holiday sales that have people buying guns and ammo.
"Worried about guns rights with Obama being reelected," said Palmdale resident Len Jugas.
Some gun owners say political concerns have spurred them to stock up, much like when President Obama was first elected in 2008. They fear Washington, D.C., will diminish gun rights.
Asked if he personally thinks there will be changes to gun rights, Jugas said: "I hope not. I don't think there will be. But just in case, you need to keep what you have and load up with what you can get."
But gun-rights advocates say the biggest threat is right here in California.
"In Sacramento, with the supermajority of the Democrats, gun control has always been on their agenda and now they are probably going to push for that as well because they don't have much opposition," said Peter Stefansky.
Whatever the cause, gun sales are skyrocketing in the Golden State. The California Department of Justice says November sales in the state are up nearly 50 percent from last year.
