With car sales down nearly a third from last year, retailers and businesses are coming up with ever more innovative ways to entice buyers to their lots. Hyundai will refund the car if the purchaser loses his or her job. Some companies are providing huge rebates or even free gas. And a car dealer in Missouri is offering a free AK-47.
Mark Muller, the owner of Max Motors in Butler, Missouri, is giving customers who purchase any truck a voucher for the semi-automatic weapon in a bid to sell at least an extra 100 vehicles. “Max Motors is giving away an AK-47 with every truck purchase!!!” reads the top of a rather large banner featuring a picture of the gun on the company’s website.
At this time last year, he was offering a similar promotion where customers could choose between a voucher for a $250 Kel-Tec pistol or the same amount of free gasoline. The idea was a success, according to Muller, and about 80 percent chose the gun. This deal doesn’t officially start until August, but he has already given away a few guns.
“We’re real firm believers in the Second Amendment,” Muller told a FOX reporter. “People should have the right to defend themselves.” He also noted that the AK-47 is primarily a home-defense weapon. “It’s all about shamelessly promoting the dealership,” he added. “We’re just trying to sell cars — You got to stand out.” The dealership’s logo is a cartoon picture of a cowboy-type with two pistols and an American flag in the background.
So far the program has been a success, Muller said. And as an added bonus, it generates a lot of publicity and really angers “liberals,” Business Insider reported. His promotion has been featured everywhere from Fox News to CNN to the New York Times. The offer has also generated some ridicule and angry responses from anti-gun commentators, but Muller does not seem to mind. His demographic is “country people,” he said.
The auto establishment’s motto is “God, guns, guts, and American pickup trucks,” he told a hostile CNN reporter, defending his offer and adding that America is a Christian nation. “We don’t want to be victims.” He admitted to a bit of “grandstanding” but said the gun could come in useful, noting that the police response time to his house is 15 minutes.
Muller is also a proponent of buying American, so he worked out a deal with a local gun shop to sell American-made AK-47s rather than the more common but generally lower-quality guns manufactured in Romania and other Eastern European countries. “I’m selling American cars; I’d rather sell American guns,” he said, defending General Motors and American automobiles in general while criticizing calls for “change.” His business primarily sells Ford, Chrysler, and General Motors’ cars and trucks.
Despite a common misconception, the AK-47s sold in America are not the automatic rifles seen so often on television. They are, as one reporter commented, “neutered” semi-automatic versions. But they are still powerful weapons. One report out of St. Louis ended the story with some intelligent advice: “Note to burglars: Avoid Butler, Mo.”
