February 15th, 2010

Coffee and Open Carry OK at Starbucks

Starbucks has rejected a request from the Brady Campaign to prohibit gun owners from openly carrying firearms in the company’s California stores. In a response to the anti-gun group’s request, the company said, “Starbucks does not have a corporate policy regarding customers and weapons; we defer to federal, state and local laws and regulations regarding this issue.”

Starbucks open carry guns

While it is difficult to obtain permits for concealed carry in most California counties, open carry of UNLOADED firearms is permitted by California state law. Members of Bay Area Open Carry (BAOC), a group of open carry advocates, have been meeting in restaurants and coffee houses in Northern California. The sight of unloaded handguns on the hips of patrons aroused the ire of the national Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. Peet’s Coffee and California Pizza kitchen caved in to anti-gun pressure, banning openly-carried firearms on their premises.

However, Starbucks has defied the Brady group, continuing to welcome Open Carry advocates at its many coffee centers. NRA instructor and BAOC member Brad Huffman declared: “We definitely applaud Starbucks for allowing law-abiding citizens to defend themselves and we will continue to patronize them as long as they do.”

The Starbucks Open Carry situation attracted national attention when the NRA emailed its millions of members, urging them to support Starbucks. The email was entitled Maybe Brady Campaign Should Switch To Decaf.

You can read more about this story in the D.C. Gun Rights Examiner Blog, which has a cogent (and amusing) commentary by Mike Stollenwerk, of OpenCarry.org.