Bass Pro Billionaire Building Megastores With Taxpayers Money

[Sherman A1]

The Bass Pro Shops store in Rancho Cucamonga, California, is little more than an hour’s drive from Santa Monica, a West Coast enclave known for its anti-gun rallies and vegetarian cafes.

It might as well be on another planet. In this 180,000-square-foot, cathedral-like structure, shoppers can buy a Remington Varmint Rifle -- $569.99 with a $50 rebate -- grab a National Rifle Association flier by the door vilifying the state’s Senator Dianne Feinstein for her effort to ban assault weapons, or order a 12-ounce New York strip steak from the adjoining restaurant.

The architect of this shooter’s paradise is John “Johnny” Morris, a media-shy Missourian who became a billionaire stitching together shopping outlets for multiple outdoor sports and adding a touch of entertainment to the mix, often using local taxpayer funds to expand his empire.

“It had been a very fragmented market, with a lot of independent retail shops catering to firearms, hunting and fishing,” said Sean Naughton, a vice president and senior research analyst who covers the consumer sector for Minneapolis -based Piper Jaffray Cos. “All these categories that consumers like to do, but there wasn’t a national chain.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-03/bass-pro-billionaire-building-megastores-with-taxpayers.html?cmpid=yhoo

[RockaFowler]

1. It's happening in my town right now

They are moving into a building originally built for Kohls right off I-95. The building was given to them for free. I never understand it. Couldn't they just buy the property themselves??

Heck it happens with WalMart, too!!

[xchrom]

2. Du rec. Nt

[Scuba]

3. From the article ...

The Public Accountability Initiative, a Buffalo, New York-based research group, estimated in a 2010 report that Bass Pro-anchored retail projects had won more than $500 million in taxpayer subsidies.

Another watchdog group, the Franklin Center for Government & Public Integrity, based in Alexandria, Virginia, estimated in August 2012 that Bass Pro and its closest competitor, Sidney, Nebraska-based Cabela’s, received or were promised more than $2.2 billion from taxpayers over the prior 15 years.

“Far from being surefire, Disney World-type attractions, Bass Pro stores often fail to spur growth and do not produce outsize economic advantages for the cities that subsidize their arrival,” the Public Accountability Initiative said in its report.

[cherokeeprogressive]

4. What utter bullshit. Cathedral-like how? It has walls?

I go there all the time. The hunter's section makes up MAYBE 10% of the floor space and is tucked away in an upstairs corner.

So what if I can have lunch 100 feet from whete I can buy a bass boat or a pair of Oakley sunglasses or a fishing hat or a pair of thermal underwear?

And the flyer? Well there's that pesky free speech thing again. I would add that I've never seen anything like that so it can't be that prominently displayed.

Cathedral-like. Boy it's nice to see the author can make a point without resorting to hyperbole.

[A HERETIC I AM]

5. Awww, come on, man....

Every single cathedral I've ever been inside had a giant display of stuffed game animals as well as 300 different deer and fish mounts on the walls!

[cherokeeprogressive]

8. Ha. The only things I've ever seen mounted in cathedrals..

Were heretics LOL.

Good news yet?

[newmember]

10. but but they sell GUNS!!!! and ammo there ........

The author is an idiot .

I shop at Bass pro all the time for my fishing needs .

[Laelth]

6. Socialism for the rich. Capitalism for the rest of us.

RFK (quoting Michael Harrington and Charles Abrams) was right about this dynamic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism_for_the_rich_and_capitalism_for_the_poor

-Laelth

[MineralMan]

7. I oppose government subsidies for private businesses, but

Bass Pro Shops are not primarily gun shops. They do sell guns, but that is a small percentage of their sales. Most of what they sell has to do with fishing. All outdoor sporting goods stores sell guns, but Bass Pro Shops is about fishing, primarily (think about the name).

[newmember]

9. Then you better be angry at

Sears , KMART , Walmart , Costco , your electric company , your internet provider etc.....


they all do the same thing

[pstokely]

11. what big box stores aren't built with taxpayer $?

they all get TIFs to build in a fields, taypayer subsidized sprawl