Shooting range alcohol: Florida firing range gets liquor license

Want a little shooting range alcohol with your target practice? Thanks to an indoor shooting range down Florida way, you’ll soon be able to have both. Volusia Top Gun, a noted Daytona Beach facility, has won the right to serve alcohol in a restaurant on the premises.

Ron Perkinson, owner of the Volusia Top Gun range and supply store, applied for a food and beverage permit earlier this summer–he wanted to convert a vacant building on the site of his range into a restaurant. Perkinson stressed that the building would not be just a bar; the idea is that you’ll come to the range, have a grand time, and then shuffle on over to the restaurant next door, where you can load up on alcoholic beverages in peace.

Perkinson further stressed that he’s only interested in keeping customers at the store once they’ve gone shooting.

“To the critics, I say, you’re right. I’m not trying to mix [shooting ranges and shooting range alcohol],” he told CBS news. “I’m trying to give you a nice meal before you go home. If you choose to have an alcoholic beverage and go home, that’s on you. It’s no different than them leaving here and going to Outback.”

Perkinson also addressed the possibility that patrons could get loaded and return to the range, saying that he would counteract the threat with proper training for his employees:

If they’re renting a handgun, or if they were bringing their own, they would do the paperwork, scan their ID. [Workers] will be trained to visually look at the person, look at their eyes, look at their pupils, just like an officer would.

The seven-member Daytona Beach City Commission voted 6-1 in favor of Perkinson’s proposal. Ruth Trager, of Zone One, was the lone dissenting vote.

(Photo credits: Pints, shooting range via Flickr)