Walking into my local Ace Hardware (Fairwood, WA) with my 13 year-old child in mid-February 2023, we discovered the sale and promotion of coffee products named “AK Espresso” (with packaging featuring a skull and 2 assault rifles), “Freedom Fuel” (with a silhouette of an assault rifle against an American flag), and “Silencer Smooth” (with technical drawings of a gun silencer) all billed as "America's Coffee." These weapon-themed products pander to the gun-obsessed and implicitly endorse the glorification of violence in the #1 country for mass shootings in the world. As a customer and citizen, I find such normalization of weapons designed for mass killing both startling and offensive. 

I shared my views with the store manager on duty at the time. His response was, “Well, THAT’s an opinion.” Ace Hardware corporate customer service shirked any responsibility whatsoever ("all stores are independently owned and operated"). I contacted four more regional and national employees of Ace Hardware (including the VP of Marketing, Kim Lefko and CEO, John Venhuizen) but received no response from any. 

Please join me in telling Ace Hardware to take corporate responsibility for its actions and choices in a country where guns are the top cause of death for children and adolescents (more than cars or drugs or drowning or anything else you might associate with danger for young people). Let's tell Ace Hardware that machines meant for perilous and violent military purposes are not appropriate marketing material for the general public. Most importantly, please join me in telling Ace Hardware to remove these gun-glorifying products from store shelves now.