Sportsman's Guide at it again!

[kb4ns]

Some of you may recall a thread here a while back about the Sportsman's Guide refusing to ship black powder guns to TN as they claimed it violated some state law (that nobody can find). Well they're at it again!

I went to place an order today for a buddy and myself so we could reach the $100 mark and use the free shipping coupon. One of the items in the order was a knife my buddy wanted. As I hit "submit order", I got a notification that the order was not successful as they do not allow the knife to be shipped to my zip code. I went back to the item description and noticed in the "warnings" area that it said:

WARNING: Cutlery cannot be shipped to Marin, Napa, Ventura and Yolo counties, CA; CO; CT; TN; D.C.; MA or Puerto Rico. Please check your State, County and City laws for restrictions before ordering Cutlery.

Yep. We're mentioned right in the middle of all those commie states once again.

While browsing the site, I've noticed that not all knives have this restriction, but many do. I spent about 10 minutes on the phone with various employees at SPG and the only real answer I got for it was "our legal department sets those restrictions and we have to follow them."

I've had a buyer's club membership for years, but I don't think I'll be renewing it again. Plus, it seems like everytime I've found something I like that they have for sale, a quick googling results in lower priced merchants elsewhere.

[BryanP]

I spent about 10 minutes on the phone with various employees at SPG and the only real answer I got for it was "our legal department sets those restrictions and we have to follow them."

I have no doubt that the people you spoke to had no real idea why TN was on the list other than "our legal dept says so." Speaking as someone who has to do stupid things for no good reason other than "The people who pay me say this is how you have to do it", I sympathize.

[daddyo]

I have a love/hate relationship with SG.

[bigwakes]

Thanks for the heads up.

[ShaunM]

Yeah I have talked to them about the muzzleloader issue and haven't got an answer as to why.

[kb4ns]

I have a love/hate relationship with SG.

You and me both! It seems like the "deals" are becoming fewer and farther between in the last couple of years.

Yeah I have talked to them about the muzzleloader issue and haven't got an answer as to why.

I sent them an email a couple years ago when I first noticed their restrictions on BP guns and got the standard response I expected and received on the phone today about the knives. :-\

[Guest BEARMAN]

I have a love/hate relationship with SG.

Me too...I used to get a catalog about every other day....not so much anymore.

Guess I didn't spend enough moolah with them.

[Oh Shoot]

...While browsing the site, I've noticed that not all knives have this restriction, but many do....

Is it the "auto assisted" ones?

If so, it's probably the "switchblade" thing rearing it's ugly head once again?

- OS

[kb4ns]

No, it was a fixed blade.

[Garufa]

SG will not even ship bayonets to TN. You know, the archaic, elongated, fixed-bladed things of yore. Not for TN.

They'll ship all the bullets you want to the Volunteer State, but not a blade.

Regardless, I've had great success working their sales for some surplus ammo goodness.

[Oh Shoot]

SG will not even ship bayonets to TN. You know, the archaic, elongated, fixed-bladed things of yore. Not for TN.

They'll ship all the bullets you want to the Volunteer State, but not a blade.

Regardless, I've had great success working their sales for some surplus ammo goodness.

kb4ns said not all knives seemed to be banned to TN, only reason I mentioned.

- OS

[kb4ns]

I've spent the last little bit looking at different items and can't figure out what the exact criteria is. It seems that they're going off blade length as most (but not all) knives with a 4" blade or longer are restricted to TN. Oh well. I don't buy many knives, but when I do in the future, I guess I'll get them from elsewhere.

[Garufa]

Sportsmans's Guide is crazy.

So I ordered 450 rounds of Yugoslavian 7.62x54r heavy ball the other day. This stuff right here: 15 Rds. 7.62x54r M30(j) 182 Gr. Ammo, Rifle Ammunition, Military/Surplus at Sportsman's Guide. Normally, this ammo is packed in 15 round boxes as pictured. Well, that is not what I received today!

Opened up the box and inside were 30 boxes (30x15=450), not as pictured and not traditional Yugo packaging. All cheap white boxes that I've seen before with repacked, filthy, picked off the warehouse floor Yugo stuff. I was about to be pissed.

Start going through the boxes which are obviously overloaded, opened one up and counted 18 shiny new rounds, all of the same year. I'm thinking maybe everything is ok until I pull the next box out and can plainly see gray colored cartridges inside, as in poly-coated steel. About to start cussing. Opened it up to find steel-cased, steel-core, green-tipped bullets, 18 of them. Green tip is commie for tracer.

In all I received 25 18-round boxes of Yugo heavy ball for 450 rounds. More or less what I ordered, PLUS 5 18-round boxes (90 total) of Hungarian or Polish Tracers!

Not endorsing SG or anything since the last time I ordered "Albanian brass-cased" x54r from them I got Russian steel. Not a big deal, ended up being as cheap if not a little cheaper than AIM.

Edited December 2, 2010 by Garufa

[hipower]

Had trouble with them as well...tried to order a knife for my brotheri-n-law and ran into the same issue--Can't ship into TN. And don't even get me started on the "free shipping" issue. I pretty much gave up on SG several years ago, and was really surprised when I got a new catalog the other day.