Vending machines selling bullets at grocery stores
- Published: Jul. 05, 2024, 12:01 p.m.
TUSCALOOSA, Alabama – Grocery stores in Alabama and Oklahoma have vending machines that allow users to purchase ammo for guns.
The vending machine supplier, American Rounds, markets “ammo sales like you’ve never seen before” on its website. The company is looking to revolutionize how ammunition for handguns, rifles and shotguns is sold.
The automated ammunition dispenser uses artificial intelligence technology to verify a buyer’s identification and age through card scanning and facial recognition software.
The buyer inserts their photo ID, and the machine conducts a scan to match it to the ID card.
In a promotional video, American Rounds CEO Grant Magers said the stores were looking for an innovative way to bring ammo sales to their stores.
Terry Stanley, COO of Fresh Value, a grocery store in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, said he is “super excited” to offer “the first ammo kiosk.”
“We’re always looking for ways to give our customers another reason to come visit our stores. Anything we can do to help them make their shopping trips easier, based on the feedback we’ve gotten from customers today, they are so excited about us having this ammo kiosk,” Stanley said in the video.
The vending machines are currently available at six locations, according to the company’s website.
During a briefing of the Tuscaloosa City Council before their regular slate of meetings, city council president Kip Tyner asked police chief Brent Blankley and other municipal leaders to explain a vending machine selling people ammunition at the Fresh Value store, according to a local news outlet.
“I got some calls about ammunition being sold in grocery store vending machines,” Tyner said. “I thought it was a joke, but it’s not.”
The city’s police chief and other city staff reported that the machines are legal and have been vetted by the ATF, according to the Tuscaloosa Thread.
