ROSEBURG, Ore. (KMTR) -- With the increase of mass shootings recently, gun shops around the US are reporting record high sales. There are two gun shops in Roseburg and both say they're having a hard time keeping up with the recent demand.
Shopkeepers have cleared shelves, re-stocked them and are clearing them out again. Even in this small community, sales have at least doubled. Roseburg gun stores are being affected by the spike of gun sales in larger cities because almost everything is back-ordered.
"The warehouses are empty," says Donna Ellison, co-owner of Flying Cloud Trading Company, one of Roseburg's gun shops.
So many people have been coming in to stores to buy guns there's even a line for background checks, which by law are necessary in Oregon when buying firearms.
"Yeah, we've been very busy since Saturday and the state background checks have been really, really high. Last night it got to as high as 350 people waiting to be checked through the state police," says Ellison. She says the most they usually see on an average day is about forty background checks.
Ellison says the items flying off the shelves the quickest are high-capacity magazines, AR rifles and handguns.
Both gun shops said sales are usually up a little this time of year with the holidays coming up, but the demand seen over the past week is far above normal.
