Elizabeth Hoffman sat behind the glass counter of her compact gun shop, surrounded by boxed firearms, old posters, and hunting rifles lining the walls. She wore green, her favorite color, and when she rose from her chair, she tucked a handgun into her left pants pocket.
“It reminds me of nature and trees, it’s very peaceful,” Hoffman said of the color.
For more than two decades, Hoffman taught preschool students in special education. She ran a day care for nearly as long. She did not imagine that her next career would involve selling shotguns and rifles.
But since 2010, Hoffman has operated Hoffman Guns and Ammo from a small shop beside her home on Hoffman Road in Pine Plains.
“The Hoffmans have lived on this road and owned this property since the 1700s,” she said, adding that the boundary between Dutchess and Columbia counties was established by a lawsuit between the Hoffman and Livingston families during that era.
Her father-in-law, John Hoffman Sr., began selling guns in 1981 to supplement the income from his dairy farm, Hoffman said. He operated three doors down from the house where she now lives with her husband and mother-in-law.
“In the old farmhouse, I used to joke that my father-in-law would tell his friends to come over and he would sell shotguns at the kitchen table while his wife was stirring the oatmeal at the other end of the kitchen.”
As the years passed, the shop became a more familiar part of Hoffman’s life.
“Like 40 years ago when I talked to my father-in-law, I said, oh my gosh, you’ve got a gun store. Oh my goodness,” Hoffman said. “Now I’m more pro gun and I understand that because of the customers that come in here. These are lovely people. Would they defend their home if a burglar came in? They probably would. But would they go randomly shooting things in the city? No, they absolutely would not.”
Hoffman took over after her father-in-law died in 2010. Despite having been part of the family for years, she knew little about firearms.
The habits of her former profession followed her behind the counter. She sits with customers and asks questions about what they are looking for and how they intend to use it.
“I take the time because I think it’s very important,” Hoffman said. “I’m educating people.”
The shop leaves little room to spare. Firearms still in their boxes occupy much of the floor, and only a couple of stools fit on the customer side of the counter. Schedules for gun club meetings and firearm training classes are posted nearby.
On the front door hangs a sign reading, “Don’t lie for the other guy,” part of a National Shooting Sports Foundation public awareness campaign aimed at preventing straw purchases, in which someone buys a firearm for another person who may not legally purchase it.
Among the shop’s inventory, Hoffman pointed to a Citadel Levtac, a roughly 6-pound shotgun.
“It looks tactical,” she said. “It shoots shot shells, even someone very skinny could use this as a home defense.”
Hoffman has 3,000 contacts saved in her phone, most of them distributors, resellers, and customers. The store deals primarily in hunting rifles, shotguns, and handguns, while also carrying ammunition, magazines, pepper spray, knives, binoculars, and accessories, including Pelican Vault gun cases.
Some of her former preschool students are now old enough to enter the shop as customers.
Hoffman said business can shift sharply from one day to the next, particularly as hunting seasons approach.
“You wouldn’t think so because we’re a really tiny store,” she said. “Sometimes I have one person, sometimes I have six people. It’s kind of hard to chuck six people in here.”
Hoffman keeps a bench outside for customers when there is no room left inside.
Several years ago, Hoffman recalled, a family entered the store looking for a hunting rifle. The husband asked detailed questions about its specifications. But when Hoffman produced the Firearms Transaction Record, the federal form used for a background check, he headed toward the door and said his wife would complete it instead.
Hoffman declined to complete the sale.
“It may have been a legitimate purchase but I believe that he probably could not pass a background check,” she said. “I’m the first line of defense to get the bad guys who want to get guns so I have to be very attentive.”
Her experience as both an educator and a firearms dealer shapes how she views school shootings.
“These are terrible tragedies,” she said. “I think that really, they stem from problems within our mental health system more than problems with firearms. It’s not the firearm that’s the danger. It’s the person who has the control over the firearm.”
Now nearing 70, Hoffman said she is ready to sell the business and retire with her husband, John Hoffman Jr., who worked as an electrical engineer for IBM for about 42 years and helps maintain the shop’s records.
She has not formally listed the business. Instead, she has begun telling customers that she is looking for a buyer, relying on the same word-of-mouth network that has sustained the shop for decades. Many of her customers are the children of people who bought firearms from her father-in-law, she said.
One person has expressed interest, Hoffman said. But she’s in no rush to sell. She said she and her husband could still be running the shop several years from now.
“We meet the needs of the local community,” she said.
Without a shop in the immediate area, Hoffman said, longtime customers might have to travel to Kingston or Millbrook for something as simple as a replacement part.
Her advice for whoever eventually takes over is straightforward: Keep accurate records, stay abreast of changing regulations, and listen to customers.
Retirement would also bring Hoffman more time with her family, she said. The couple has two children. One lives nearby and helps operate the family farm across the street. The other is a police officer in Arkansas and has a child about a year and a half old.
Hoffman said she looks forward to spending more time with her grandchild. She and her husband would also like to travel, perhaps to Alaska and the Rocky Mountains.
“We’ve been doing this for a long time,” Hoffman said. “My husband and I are getting to the point where we want to get some other things accomplished before we ride off into the sunset.”