ZX Gun sees an increase in first-time gun buyers during COVID-19 shutdown

The most recent gun license statistics from Indiana State Police, showed there are 41,646 active licenses in Allen County.

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Fort wayne firearm retailers have to limit the number of customers they can let inside their storesbut say it hasn't slowed down salesfox 55's jeremy masukevich tells us which customers firearm retailers are seeing an increase in during the covid-19 shutdown.

Nat jones we have sold a lot of guns because people are scared.

And it's unfortunate that that's the situation we are in right now.

Zx gun manager phil jones says new restrictions from the governor's stay at home order hasn't stopped customers from lining up outside.sot jones yes we have had a steady line outside, but that's just because we are limited on the number of people we can have in the store right now.jones says they saw a spike even before the order and business has been steady since.

Sot jones before any stay at home order was in effect we did see an increase in business because this is an election year and some people thought hey maybe this virus thing might become a big deal.

Like other gun sellers zx guns has had to make several adjustments including only allowing five customers at a time dedicating hours for those most at risk and closing in the middle of the day to deep clean.but jones says it hasn't hurt business.

Nat jones we are generally busy all the time.

There is always one reason or another for people to be flooding into the store.he says some of those reasons include fear and anxiety in response to covid-19.

They've particularly seen an increase in first-time gun buyers.sot jones we have had a lot of people that were not gun people before that said, 'we never thought about having a gun in the house before, but with all this going on we just feel like its time.'according to the most recent gun license statistics released in january...allen county has the third most active licenses in the state with close to 42,000 falling behind only marion and lake counties.sot jones we are just trying to make sure everybody stays safe.

The better people adhere to the rules the quicker we will get through this and get back to normal.in fort wayne, jeremy masukevich, fox 55 news we reached out to several other fort wayne firearm retailers and while some say they were too busy to go on camera they did tell us they've seen an increase in sales.