Dick’s Sporting Goods shifts further away from guns even as sales suffer

Dick’s Sporting Goods, one of the largest firearms retailers in the United States, is moving further away from selling guns, even as the shift takes a toll on its earnings.

Dick’s said this week that it would strip firearms and other hunting products from 125 of its stores and replace the merchandise with batting cages, ski apparel and other sports gear. If the switch is successful, as it was at 10 stores where it was tested last year, it will be expanded, the company said.

The latest move to scale back gun sales is becoming a familiar one for the company and CEO Edward Stack.

Last year, after 17 people were killed in a shooting in Parkland, Fla., Stack learned that the suspect, Nikolas Cruz, once bought a gun from Dick’s. That firearm was not used in the attack, but Stack realized it could have been.

Shaken by the link, Stack, a longtime gun owner, introduced measures that made it harder to buy firearms at Dick’s stores, and he pressed Congress to adopt gun-safety measures. He aligned himself with gun-control activists; was shunned by gun sellers, buyers and firearms industry employees; and became one of the most cited names in a gun debate increasingly crowded with corporate voices.

He appeared at conferences with other executives with strong opinions on gun control. In the process, Stack became a model for business leaders wading into contentious social issues.

But his approach may have put pressure on his company, which sells much more than guns. Dick’s said this week that adjusted same-store sales fell 3.1 percent in the 12 months that ended Feb. 2 from the comparable period a year earlier.

In the fourth quarter, which included the holiday shopping season, adjusted same-store sales were down 2.2 percent. Net income for the quarter fell to $102.6...