By David Olinger
Denver Post Staff Writer

Feb. 1 – Sturm, Ruger and Co. says a new company requirement that firearms dealers sell its products “exclusively” at their regular places of business was not meant to prevent Ruger sales at weekend gun shows.

At the same time, the company said it prefers not to have dealers “consummate” sales at those shows.

“Our policy is that a legitimate storefront … dealer may exhibit Ruger guns at gun shows,” the company said, but “we would prefer that he actually consummate the sale at his gun store … because we think it’s a better place for the sale to occur than in the hurried, public atmosphere of a gun show.” The company clarification was issued Thursday, 12 days after The Denver Post, followed by other media, reported that the nation’s largest gun manufacturer had become the first to discourage sales of its products at gun shows.

Stephen Sanetti, Sturm, Ruger’s general counsel, attributed those reports to a mistake by a Ruger distributor who notified thousands of gun store owners not to “display or sell any Ruger firearms at any gun shows.” Policy “misunderstood” AmChar Wholesale Inc., a Ruger distributor in Rochester, N.Y., “misunderstood our policy and sent a flier out to dealers saying Ruger doesn’t want its products sold at gun shows,” Sanetti said in a phone message to The Post.

But AmChar’s owner, Tony DiChario, said Ruger approved that notice before he sent it.

He said he asked Sanetti to review his gun-show statement and “they said it was very good.” Dave Anver, a leading Colorado firearms dealer who sells Rugers at gun shows, said he believes Ruger retreated in the face of overwhelming opposition at the Shooting Hunting and Outdoor Trade show in Las Vegas in January, the gun industry’s annual trade show.

“I think they’re definitely backtracking,” said Anver, owner of Dave’s Guns in Aurora. “There was a hullabaloo at the SHOT show, everybody was coming up to them, saying, “How could you do this?’” Anver also noted that AmChar distributed a catalog at the SHOT show, without objection from Ruger representatives in attendance, that reiterated Ruger firearms must only be sold at gun stores.

In an industry facing litigation on several fronts, “all these companies are walking a tightrope between doing the responsible thing, and being terrified that the NRA is going to create havoc for them if they do the responsible thing,” said Jon Lowy, a senior attorney for the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence.

Since 1985, Sturm, Ruger policy has limited distribution of its guns to federally li censed firearms dealers with storefronts.

In December it added one word – exclusively – to the policy. Its contract with distributors now limits Ruger products “to federally licensed firearms dealers selling exclusively from their regular place of business.”

AmChar interpreted that to exclude gun shows. So did a Ruger representative who returned a call from The Post to Sanetti and read that provision on Jan. 14.

Sanetti said in the phone message that’s not what Ruger meant. The word “exclusively” was added “because some retail dealers were advertising in trade publications, selling mail order to others” licensed as firearms dealers, he said.

Sanetti did not explain why Ruger was more worried about sales between licensed firearms dealers than gun-show sales. He did not return subsequent calls from The Post.

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