When Aaron Naparstek began a Twitter thread calling attention to the fact that a major arms and ammunition manufacturer, Vista Outdoor, also owns popular recreation brands like Giro, Bell, Jimmy Styks, and CamelBak, he wasn’t intending to spark any kind of international boycott. The 47-year-old urban planner and bicycling advocate from Brooklyn enjoys a respectable social media following (6,400 Twitter followers and counting) and is well-regarded in the cycling community as the founder of the site StreetsblogUSA. But he had no expectations that his Tweets would take off as they have. Like many people, he was simply trying to make some sense of the Valentine’s Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. 

“I was just surprised to discover that these biking brands are, in fact, all owned by one of America’s biggest arms dealers,” Naparstek told Sierra. “You know, you just put stuff on Twitter and it spreads. It’s been really great to see this groundswell of advocacy really move the needle on gun control.”

Consider the needle moved, if only a little bit. Naparstek’s initial surprise quickly translated into grassroots outrage, and, just 10 days after his initial posts, several major retailers have announced they are severing ties with Vista Outdoor. On Thursday, REI announced that it is temporarily suspending new orders of Vista Outdoor products. That decision came after Mountain Equipment Co-op (the Canadian version of REI) said it was halting sales of Vista Outdoor brands in response to a Change.org petition that quickly racked up more than 50,000 signatures.

REI’s statement said

REI does not sell guns. We believe that it is the job of companies that manufacture and sell guns and ammunition to work towards commonsense solutions that prevent the type of violence that happened in Florida last month. In the last few days, we’ve seen such action from companies like Dick’s Sporting Goods and Walmart, and we applaud their leadership. 

This week, we have been in active discussions with Vista Outdoor, which has recently acquired several companies that are longtime partners of REI. These include Giro, Bell, CamelBak, Camp Chef, and Blackburn. 

This morning we learned that Vista does not plan to make a public statement that outlines a clear plan of action. As a result, we have decided to place a hold on future orders of products that Vista sells through REI while we assess how Vista proceeds. 

Naturally, Naparstek was pleased by the retailers’ decision, though he cautioned that this is just the beginning of what will have to be a larger effort to sustain the pressure on Vista Outdoor.

“I’m happy to see that REI responded as they did,” he wrote in an email. “Still, it’s going to be incumbent on us to make sure that REI follows through on their promise and to expand the campaign and apply pressure to other retailers who continue to sell brands and products owned by NRA-supporting Vista Outdoor.”

While it might seem strange that a gun-and-ammo maker is also the seller of child bike seats, standup paddleboards, and backyard grills, it’s just one example of how corporate conglomerates often gobble smaller brands into their portfolios.

In 2015 (the same year that the NRA’s National Rifleman magazine hailed the firm as “the biggest company in the outdoor recreation sector”), Vista Outdoor made an effort to acquire companies outside of its core arms business. It bought CamelBak in 2015 for $413 million, and the following year scooped up Bell, Giro, and Blackburn, which makes bike parts and accessories. The diversification was evidently an attempt to hedge against volatility in the arms business. The arms industry profited from skyrocketing gun sales during the Obama years; “the Barack boom,” it was called, as gun owners, paranoid about the government coming to seize their weapons, went on a buying spree. But after Trump was elected, gun sales plummeted, and the industry took a hammering. Vista Outdoor's stock lost 62 percent of its value last year.

Vista Outdoor's various ammunition, firearms, and gun-accessory brands include Savage Arms. The company manufactures and sells traditional hunting weapons like bolt-action rifles and shotguns, but it also markets military-grade “modern sporting rifles” that few sportsmen would need (or want) for game hunting. (Adam Lanza, the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooter, reportedly used a Savage rifle to murder his mother.) Given its core business, it’s not surprising that Vista Outdoor has close connections to the National Rifle Association. The company’s brands have underwritten programs on NRA TV and have also sponsored NRA events like the organization’s World Shooting Championship.           

And that’s exactly what disturbed Naparstek, who says he is not opposed to gun sales per se and who sometimes takes his kids target shooting during summer vacations to Vermont.

“What was most troubling to me is that Vista Outdoor doesn’t just sell guns and ammo; they are also a really aggressive supporter of the NRA,” Naparstek said. “The notion that when you buy a bike helmet, some portion of that will go to the NRA is troubling to me.… I just don’t want my money going to the NRA. I think it’s a toxic, out-of-control organization.”           

Since the boycott campaign began, Vista Outdoor has remained silent; the company has not responded to any media requests, including from Sierra. But at least one subsidiary brand, bike-accessory company Blackburn, has sought to distance itself from its parent company. A statement posted Thursday on the company’s website reads

A major concern for the boycott centers around the incorrect assumption that the purchase of any of our products may support a cause that does not fit the mission/values of our brand. That is not the case. Our brand falls within the Outdoor Products segment of our company, which operates separately from Vista Outdoor’s Shooting Sports segment. Since 1975, Blackburn has maintained a commitment to the cycling community and travel-by-bike ethos. We support trail advocacy groups across the U.S., nonprofit organizations encouraging cycling as a healthy lifestyle, and local groups working to make cycling more accessible for all.

It seems unlikely that such statements will mollify critics. For his part, Naparstek is now working to draw attention to the fact that, in addition to its relationships with the NRA, Vista Outdoor also supports politicians who are opposed to public lands protections—a stance that is poorly aligned with the values of many of its customers. In the 2016 election cycle, the two largest recipients of donations from Vista Outdoor's political action committee were Utah House Republicans Rob Bishop and Chris Stewart, both of whom have been vocal supporters of Donald Trump’s efforts to roll back the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase–Escalante National Monuments. 

“When a customer goes to REI and buys a CamelBak hydration system, some portion of that money they spend at REI, some portion of that expenditure is going to those congressmen who are spearheading the effort to buy public lands,” Naparstek said. 

The NRA and many of its members have expressed outrage at the grassroots campaigns to boycott companies with ties to the organization. “I find it interesting that those individuals who simultaneously preach about free speech want to silence the speech of the millions of people who make up NRA membership,” Dana Loesch, the NRA spokesperson and media personality, wrote on Twitter.

But free speech goes many directions; any citizen has the right not to support speech they don’t like. With the boycott of Vista Outdoor, cyclists and others are simply putting their money where their mouth is—and declaring that they won’t be funding companies with whom they disagree on the crucial issue of gun control.