Virginia Firearm Sales Level Off to Pre-2013 Levels But Still on Pace to Be Second Best Year in History

The Richmond Times Dispatch has this story today that notes 2014 firearm sales are running approximately 23% lower than the same period in 2013:

Gun transactions have fallen every month from Jan. 1 through the end of July compared with the same period in 2013. Cumulatively, the numbers dropped from 286,480 transactions for January through July last year to 219,491 for this year. 

Firearm sales at 45 gun shows across Virginia also declined during the first seven months of 2014, from 24,870 transactions in 2013 to 20,492 this year, a drop of 21 percent. Gun show transactions represented 9.3 percent of the state’s total transactions through federally licensed firearms dealers.

Last year's sales were driven by the direct assault on our rights by Obama.  But, while sales are down a little less 25% from last year, they are still higher than 2012 and 2014 is on pace to still be the second best year for firearm sales on record:

“While firearm transactions seem to be declining, it’s important to recognize that 2014 is still on pace to be the second-highest year for firearm transactions in Virginia, outpacing 2012 by nearly 5 percent,” said Thomas R. Baker, an assistant professor at Virginia Commonwealth University’s L. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs who specializes in criminology theory and has an interest in gun-related issues.

The number of firearm transactions through the first seven months of 2012 totaled 209,591, compared with this year’s 219,491.

Baker also rather than looking at this year's numbers compared to last year, we should look at the general pattern of firearm purchase over the last several years:

The percentage increase in Virginia gun transactions has grown steadily — in some cases dramatically — every year since Obama has been in office except for 2010, records show. The annual number grew 7.2 percent in 2009, dipped to 3.7 percent in 2010, and then climbed in the double digits over the next three years — 16 percent in 2011, 35 percent in 2012 and 11 percent last year.

It was to be expected that sales would not continue at the pace they set last year.  But it is also clear from the above numbers that firearms sales, at lease in Virginia, are still increasing at a healthy pace, and that's good news for Virginia's firearm retailers.