Sprouts Market - 30.06

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Glenn E. Meyer

New member
My wife and I have shopped in Sprouts Market quite a bit.

The other day, I was shocked to see a legit 30.06 sign on the door. For those of us in TX, that is the sign a business uses for forbid the carry of licensed concealed handguns.

I approached the manager and expressed my concern. I told him that I would cease shopping there. I pointed out that the carry population had a crime rate less than 1/10 that of the standard TX population. I pointed out that they announcing to criminals that the patrons (lots of old people) are now ripe for the picking. I made the standard logical arguments.

The manager told me that many of the employees are outraged and the decision came from up top.

I have written to Sprouts through their contact page. I also posted this (as have others in TX on the texas3006.com site).

Their corporate contact info is :

M-F If you'd like to speak directly with a Sprouts representative, you can always call us at 480-814-8016 or toll-free at 1-888-577-7688.
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http://sprouts.com/contact

Polite messages to them about their signs would be appreciated.

Glenn
 
Interesting find... from their website, when you click on the "NEWS" link at the top, the very first article listed is about donating to the Aurora Shooting Victims Fund. What's interesting about it is that it's from Aug12. If you click on the "read all news" link on the page, it will show you that there have been many updates since then... the webmaster for some reason is intentionally showing that particular article link on the main page.

Also to note, this past summer, Sprouts went from private to public ownership.

Also found this on another website:

Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts about our decision to prohibit firearms in our stores. Please understand that we recognize and respect our customers’ rights under the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, a right that prohibits the government (but not private retailers) from infringing on citizens’ right to bear arms. That right, however, must be balanced with our need as a retailer to provide a safe and comfortable environment for our customers and team members. That’s why, after careful and thoughtful analysis, we have decided to prohibit our customers and our team members from bringing firearms onto our store premises. While this decision may disappoint some of our valued customers, such as yourself, we stand by our decision and have received overwhelmingly positive feedback from our communities about it.
We hope that you will continue to be a part of the Sprouts family notwithstanding our decision on this issue. We value your patronage and hope to see you again soon.
Sincerely,
Stephanie
Sprouts Farmers Market
Customer Relations Specialist

I'd recommend giving them a call/email and visiting their Facebook page and leaving commentary.
 
The fight is never ending indeed. Hopefully they will get enough patrons to write/call them and their decision gets reversed. Public outcry has a tendency to do just that in some cases.

Thanks for sharing.:)
 
While this decision may disappoint some of our valued customers, such as yourself, we stand by our decision and have received overwhelmingly positive feedback from our communities about it.
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That, folks, is how we lose. The owners and management are going to put much more stock into the "thank you for making your establishment safe for my children" correspondence than they are the stuff that reads "shove your fashist anti-freedom policy I'll never go their again !@#"

If you're going to correspond with a business like this, be succinct, cordial, and factual. You're not only representing the gun culture, you're also countering the noise from our less articulate brethren.
 
That, folks, is how we lose. The owners and management are going to put much more stock into the "thank you for making your establishment safe for my children" correspondence than they are the stuff that reads "shove your fashist anti-freedom policy I'll never go their again !@#"
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Tom, I don't believe for a second that there have been more people independently contact the company thanking them for this move than have contacted them saying they will no longer be customers... not for one second do I believe this. Nor do I believe that managers have stood at the door and randomly asked customers for their opinions about the signs and corporate move and whether they truly feel safer. Nor do I believe that numbers of people have been calling/writing/emailing the company asking them to make this move for the greater good... that kind of stuff simply doesn't happen in any fashion that can be described as "overwhelming".

The whole "overwhelmingly positive feedback" line is straight out of the public relations catch-phrase book to try and minimize the impact we think we have in the potential to change their mind... in other words, to get us to give up because this is already a done deal.

Nope, what I suspect happened is that some anti-gun puppet organization backed by a certain billionaire contacted Sprouts and asked them if they wanted to be the next Starbucks. The lawyers and bean-counters added up the cost of negative publicity among the soccer-mom/hippie/left/college/whatever types against us dumb rednecks who only eat the stuff we kill and grow ourselves... and now we have the signs.

And although I hate to say it, you can probably thank open-carry for a lot of this... yes, I know there's no open carry in TX, but just one soccer-mom in Arizona sees Bubba strapped up with a Judge in line behind her while she's buying farm-raised organic hummus and writes a letter is going to be enough to convince any company that they need to decide which side of the bread the butter is on.
 
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Tom, I don't believe for a second that there have been more people independently contact the company thanking them for this move than have contacted them saying they will no longer be customers.
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It's not about the numbers; it's about the signal. People like to be congratulated and thanked more than they like to be chastised and punished. So, while the attaboys may be coming from the minority (and some of those may very well be astroturfed), those are the ones that get accepted.

That's why we have to be temperate and careful in our communications in cases like this.

When it comes to Starbucks, the analogy doesn't really fit. Starbucks did their best to toe the line. They haven't (erm...) prohibited carry; they've just done their best to discourage it. Sprouts has flat-out forbidden it.
 
It's not about the numbers; it's about the signal. People like to be congratulated and thanked more than they like to be chastised and punished. So, while the attaboys may be coming from the minority (and some of those may very well be astroturfed), those are the ones that get accepted.
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I don't buy it. Check out the board-of-directors for Sprouts... each person has a long history of being major players in multi-billion-dollar coroporations for decades. The resume for each one is a who's who of CEO's/CFO's/etc. People like that don't make policy based on minority attaboys because they see through them... they make policy based on money and politics. Again, this company recently went public. They took a look at their demographic, ran some graphs and charts, hired a specialist, and in the end... the loss of revenue from a few carry-types was not worth the cost of being yet another company in the news "famous" for supporting guns.

When it comes to Starbucks, the analogy doesn't really fit. Starbucks did their best to toe the line. They haven't (erm...) prohibited carry; they've just done their best to discourage it. Sprouts has flat-out forbidden it.
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My reference to Starbucks was not about the actual policy, but about being a focal-point of a national debate about a controversial topic. Yes, Starbucks would have remained quiet and neutral forever if given the opportunity. Both sides of this debate chimed in forced them to issue "official policy".

Sprouts probably would also have remained quiet forever given the opportunity (because more customers is better than less customers), but a combination of that likely phone call from an anti-gun entity plus the occasional anti-open-carry letter forced their hand... and rather than be dragged into a national spotlight like Starbucks, they chose to nip it in the bud and get rid of carry altogether... and issue an official statement specifically worded to let pro-carry types know that there's nothing we can do to change their minds.

And I agree wholeheartedly about the tone of our communications... unfortunately, that boat sailed awhile ago for Sprouts. They're not interested in what we have to say, and short of turning them into Starbucks with a picketing campaign and "outing them", it's just over.
 
If a enough of us faxed or emailed a copy of our grocery receipts FROM THEIR COMPETITORS, once a month, they might soon get an idea of their losses.

I live in Vegas, and I haven't seen any no firearms signs at their locations here yet. When I do, I will obey them and shop elsewhere.
 
If a enough of us faxed or emailed a copy of our grocery receipts FROM THEIR COMPETITORS, once a month, they might soon get an idea of their losses.
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I hate to be the one to say it, but I've never heard of that causing a business to reverse a no-carry policy.

First off, there simply aren't as many of us who are that worked up over it. Second, we can send in receipts from competitors, but does that mean we were Sprouts customers before the policy changed?
 
Bartholomew Roberts said:
FWIW, I haven't seen any 30.06 signs at any of the DFW locations either.
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Forest & Marsh in NW Dallas has the signs up. I'll check Coit & Campbell in Richardson during the next few days.
Tom Servo said:
...we can send in receipts from competitors, but does that mean we were Sprouts customers before the policy changed?
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As soon as I have time to add it all up, I'm going to send them a letter with the amount my family spent at Sprouts in 2013. It's a considerable amount. :)
 
SamNavy said:
...the loss of revenue from a few carry-types was not worth the cost of being yet another company in the news "famous" for supporting guns.
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This doesn't make any sense to me. I've never heard of a company getting harassed over silence on the gun issue. (That's not what happened to StarBucks either.) The vast, vast majority of companies large and small have no such "No Carry" policy of any kind. They simply ignore the issue. They're not "famous for supporting guns". No one pays any attention whatsoever.
 
Well, from the AR15.com thread, it looks like the signs have gone up here as well. I had not seen them at my local Sprouts, apparently because the manager there had the sense to post them as far away from the door and as obscurely as possible in the hopes he wouldn't have to deal with the mess; but according to another poster at ARF, they are now posted as well.

I'll definitely be contacting them to register a complaint and I'll not shop there if they are going to keep that policy.

First off, there simply aren't as many of us who are that worked up over it. Second, we can send in receipts from competitors, but does that mean we were Sprouts customers before the policy changed?
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Maybe I'm more organized than most; but I think if you have been a Sprouts customer that looking over your checking records or credit/debit card statements to let them know exactly what you are spending with them is helpful. I know I spent around $600 with Sprouts in December. When they start thinking about how they are losing $7000 a year or so just from one single customer who bothered to take the time to contact them, they might start to get a better appreciation for what it costs to have stupid policies.
 
Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts about our decision to prohibit firearms in our stores. Please understand that we recognize and respect our customers’ rights under the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, a right that prohibits the government (but not private retailers) from infringing on citizens’ right to bear arms. That right, however, must be balanced with our need as a retailer to provide a safe and comfortable environment for our customers and team members. That’s why, after careful and thoughtful analysis, we have decided to prohibit our customers and our team members from bringing firearms onto our store premises. While this decision may disappoint some of our valued customers, such as yourself, we stand by our decision and have received overwhelmingly positive feedback from our communities about it.
We hope that you will continue to be a part of the Sprouts family notwithstanding our decision on this issue. We value your patronage and hope to see you again soon.
Sincerely,
Stephanie
Sprouts Farmers Market
Customer Relations Specialist
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This is the exact response I got Tuesday, 12/31/2013, as a reply to my email explaining I would no longer be shopping in their Fort Worth, TX store.
So the canned response is the default when they get email regarding their new policy.
 
Please excuse my ignorance, but what is the Legal penalty for entering a 30-06 posted business while carrying in Texas?

Does the sign carry any weight in law? Here in MN the signs carry no weight and crossing one means nothing. They can ask you to leave with or without the sign. Failure to leave immediately after being asked is punishable by a $25 trespass violation.
 
Sec. 30.06. TRESPASS BY HOLDER OF LICENSE TO CARRY CONCEALED HANDGUN. (a) A license holder commits an offense if the license holder: (1) carries a handgun under the authority of Subchapter H, Chapter 411, Government Code, on property of another without effective consent; and(2) received notice that: (A) entry on the property by a license holder with a concealed handgun was forbidden; or(B) remaining on the property with a concealed handgun was forbidden and failed to depart.(b) For purposes of this section, a person receives notice if the owner of the property or someone with apparent authority to act for the owner provides notice to the person by oral or written communication.(c) In this section: (1) "Entry" has the meaning assigned by Section 30.05(b).(2) "License holder" has the meaning assigned by Section 46.035(f).(3) "Written communication" means: (A) a card or other document on which is written language identical to the following: "Pursuant to Section 30.06, Penal Code (trespass by holder of license to carry a concealed handgun), a person licensed under Subchapter H, Chapter 411, Government Code (concealed handgun law), may not enter this property with a concealed handgun"; or(B) a sign posted on the property that: (i) includes the language described by Paragraph (A) in both English and Spanish; (ii) appears in contrasting colors with block letters at least one inch in height; and(iii) is displayed in a conspicuous manner clearly visible to the public.(d) An offense under this section is a Class A misdemeanor.(e) It is an exception to the application of this section that the property on which the license holder carries a handgun is owned or leased by a governmental entity and is not a premises or other place on which the license holder is prohibited from carrying the handgun under Section 46.03 or 46.035.
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Section copied from http://www.statutes.legis.state.tx.us/Docs/PE/htm/PE.30.htm
 
I wonder if anyone has polled those who legally carry concealed on their percentage of internet shopping. I often hear people in retail complaining of the impact of the growth of internet shopping on "brick-n-mortar" retail stores and the "sales tax advantage" of online retailers (rapidly fading). I have to wonder if any significant percentage of those losses to online shopping are related to carry restrictions.

Online grocery shopping may lag behind online shopping for non-perishables, but I suspect it will gain ground. Almost all of my tea is purchased online, as it is difficult to find locally.


Additionally, last I heard, the question of whether similar signs posted in Mississippi businesses are "notice" had not yet been answered (crosses fingers).
 
If you are contacting Sprouts, here are some suggestions I thought might be helpful:

1. If you shop there already, let them know it. Look through your checks or bank records and give them specific amounts and dates you spent money with them, especially over the holidays.

2. They are claiming this is for safety reasons - we need to explain to them that as a CHL holder who is carrying a handgun, their policy INCREASES the unholstered handling of a firearm in public, which is rarely a positive factor in safety. A CHL must remove their firearm (how many safe directions are there to point a firearm while doing this?), stow it in their vehicle (where only a pane of safety glass is between it and theft) before entering the store. Upon exiting the store, they need to retrieve the firearm and put it back in its holster. The alternative is to go home to drop off the firearm then return or simply shop somewhere that doesn't make you do stupid things.

3. We should point out that a foreseeable consequence of this policy is increased gun handling in Sprouts parking lots as well as fewer customers who choose to put up with this.

4. In Texas in any case, neither Whole Foods nor Central Market post 30.06 signs... on the "normal" grocery level, neither do Aldis, Albertsons, Tom Thumb, Kroger, WalMart, etc. There are lots of options for CHLs to chose from when buying groceries.

5. The policy targets only those customers who the Texas Department of Public Safety has certified are free from any felonies and Class A or B misdemeanors in the last 10 years, as well as the only customers who have had at least 10 hours of state-mandated firearms training as well as periodic supplemental training during renewals. They are essentially telling the very customers who are least likely to cause them a problem that they are not welcome.

Final thought, don't lose hope or be complacent - Whole Foods for one (the one on Royal) did in fact used to have a 30.06 sign posted. They removed it. A concise, well-written, non-spittle flinging letter can make a difference if you will take the time to explain it to them.
 
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