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Mike McPhate reports in The New York Times that two home shopping industry veterans, Valerie Castle and Doug Bornstein, are set to premier GunTV, a new 24-Hour shopping channel for guns, that aims to take the QVC approach of peppy hosts pitching "a vast array of firearms," as well as related items like bullets, holsters and two-way radios. The new cable channel hopes to help satisfy Americans' insatiable appetite for firearms. The channel's forthcoming debut might seem remarkably ill-timed, given recent shootings at a Planned Parenthood in Colorado Springs and at a social services center in San Bernardino, California but gun sales have been rising for years, with nearly 21 million background checks performed in 2014, and they appear on track to a new record this year. The boom has lately been helped by a drumbeat of mass shootings, whose attendant anxiety has only driven more people into the gun store.
The proposed schedule of programming allots an eight-minute segment each hour to safety public service announcements in between proposed segments on topics like women's concealed weapon's apparel, big-game hunting and camping. Buying a Glock on GunTV won't be quite like ordering a pizza. When a firearm is purchased, a distributor will send it to a retailer near the buyer, where it has to be picked up in person and a federal background check performed. "We saw an opportunity in filling a need, not creating one," says Castle. "The vast majority of people who own and use guns in this country, whether it's home protection, recreation or hunting, are responsible .... I don't really know that it's going to put more guns on the streets."
Critics suggest that Gun TV could make the decision to purchase a weapon seem trivial—on the same level as ordering a Snuggie or a vertical egg cooker. "Buying a gun is a serious decision," says Laura Cutilletta, senior staff attorney at the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. "If you are going to buy a gun for your home, it's not a decision you should be making at three in the morning because you are watching TV."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 10 2015, @07:54PM
I find it interesting. Interesting in the fact they think they can have a 24/7 roll of that sort of thing.
The 24/7 shopping channels I sorta get. As you can veg out and watch it. But this seems rather one one product type line. Perhaps it will just end up being something like 'cabelas' or something where guns are one of the products offered. If they stick to just guns and gun paraphernalia I just dont see it lasting long unless they can get crazy margin and produce it on the super cheap.
I used to watch a *lot* of TV (memorized tv listings and 2 PVRs going). Even then I could not bring myself to watch this sort of thing. Doing much better now. In the end the advertisements were just too much of which a channel like this is.
They must be doing OK or the shopping format would have died years ago.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by dyingtolive on Thursday December 10 2015, @08:03PM
I don't think the people propping up this market are the most intelligent or coherent people.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!