I Used a Bullet Vending Machine. It Taught Me Something Grim About America. (2024)

A large wooden cross edged with a string of Christmas lights stands proudly on the clean-cut lawn of a Noble, Oklahoma, home.

Surrounding houses are similar: Metal and glass crosses decorate gardens and hang from porches next to twinkling wind chimes; you’d be hard-pressed to find a home without an American flag waving out front, too.

It’s the definitive rural American city. Noble is deep in the Bible Belt and home to about 7,700 people; its residents are statistically more likely to be Republican, attend church, and own a gun.

So it’s fitting that this city was one of the first to see the installation of a one-of-a-kind gun ammunition vending machine in its local grocery store. The machines, sold by a company called American Rounds, sell ammo for handguns, rifles, and shotguns, and use artificial intelligence technology to verify the identity and age of each customer.

Just seven miles south of Norman—one of Oklahoma’s largest and most liberal cities (relatively)—the Noble Super C Mart is one of four stores in the state to have the 2,000-pound machine plopped down inside its entrance. Alabama and neighboring Texas also have the machines—and American Rounds CEO Grant Magers told me this is just the beginning.

​​“What situation are you in where you’re like, ‘Oh, I need to get eggs and I need to get ammo?’”

Immediately upon their installation, people from either side of the Second Amendment debate voiced their appreciation or skepticism for the bullets-made-convenient hunk of metal. And not just in the states where the machines are located.

The New York Times, CNN, USA Today, and NPR were all quick to report on the ammo machines, highlighting widespread concerns for safety and regulation. And if you scroll the Facebook comment section of just about any article on American Rounds, you’ll find a flood of polarizing opinions.

“Well this is a step in the wrong direction,” one user wrote under a Facebook post from Oklahoma broadcast station KOCO.

“WTF are these guys thinking?” My thoughts exactly, at first.

And perhaps most revealingly: “Hell yeah that’s the most American thing I’ve seen and I love it.”

I decided to see what all the fuss was about.

My relationship with guns is a complex one. Living in Oklahoma, I’m used to seeing crossed-gun Second Amendment bumper stickers on the backs of trucks and gun holsters displayed proudly on people’s waists. I have family members who are in the military and law enforcement—I was taught to respect guns, not to fear them.

But here’s the thing: I do fear them. How could I not when there have been over 300 mass shootings across the country just this year? So I didn’t know what to expect—or how I would feel—when I drove to a grocery store in Noble to visit one of the ammo machines.

The machines, as many familiar with the ammunition-buying world were quick to point out, aren’t all that different from other ammo purchasing methods. In fact, in some ways, it’s more regulated. The A.I. scans your face and compares the image to your ID to verify its validity and your age, similar to what you see in an airport. Magers, the CEO, said it can detect a fake ID or if a person is using an ID that isn’t theirs. Federal law prohibits dealers from selling handgun ammunition to anyone under 21 and long gun ammunition to anyone under 18, so the company set an across-the-board 21-year age requirement.

Magers told me American Rounds doesn’t store customer information, but some people are still concerned. Face-scanning technology, such as the kind American Rounds’ machines use, is one way companies can gather biometric data, or data that identifies a person’s physical or behavioral characteristics. Theoretically, this information could be used by companies or agencies to track who is purchasing ammunition to develop marketing or political campaigns targeted to those demographics. There’s no comprehensive federal law regulating the use and distribution of biometric data, though some states have passed measures to protect the privacy of individuals.

“We are the only company in America that requires an identification check at every single transaction,” Magers said. With brick-and-mortar and online ammunition sales, there’s no guarantee IDs are always checked or verified, he argued. The heavy and double-walled steel structure of the machine is also less likely to be pilfered from than stores with ammunition sitting on an open shelf. There’s no cap on how much ammunition a single customer can purchase, though the amount is limited by the machine’s capacity.

Many people were understandably concerned by the machine’s 24/7 accessibility, which was advertised on the American Rounds website under the banner “Convenience.” But after a conversation with Magers in which he told me: “We’re not available 24/7,” I read from his company’s website where it said exactly that. It turns out that was a marketing error and the machines are not, in fact, available 24/7. Instead, they’re only accessible during the operating hours of the stores where they are located (they are indoors and typically monitored by cameras). The website has since been updated.

Logistical concerns regarding the machines aside, the concept itself is inherently divisive—for obvious reasons. Gun advocates have long argued that ammunition should be more easily purchased and accessible, while gun safety advocates push for the exact opposite.

“It’s either, ‘That’s pointless, why are we doing this?’ or ‘That’s cool.’ There’s really nothing in between,” Joshua Harris-Till, the communications lead for the Oklahoma chapter of the gun regulation advocacy group Moms Demand Action, told me about the machines. When American Rounds first made headlines, I’d say I fell into the former category.

David Yamane, a professor of sociology at Wake Forest University and an expert on guns in America, told me that any time something regarding guns moves into the fore—like, say, an A.I.-powered bullet vending machine—it just adds fuel to the fire.

The vending machines “are like this Rorschach test,” Yamane said. “You put that in front of people and [their] responses tell you everything about how they view guns generally.”

However, the issue isn’t clean-cut even amongst the staunchest gun supporters. Don Spencer, president of the Oklahoma Second Amendment Association, was initially enticed by the convenience of an ammunition vending machine. Then he thought twice.

“This is a trap,” he told me. “It is a registration for the government to find out who is purchasing what, and it’s not government business if a peaceful citizen is purchasing ammunition.”

When told that the company promises never to store customer information, Spencer was skeptical. “I don’t trust it,” he said. “Who can you trust?”

Spencer said he’s talked to several firearm owners who echoed his concerns for privacy regarding the machines. His opinion is that there should not be government regulation of legal firearm and ammunition purchases, nor should there be an age restriction for buying bullets. However, he conceded that the vending machine would be a fallback for him; something to use when he’s in a pinch and alternative purchasing options are not available.

As in Texas and Alabama, Oklahoma is a deep-red state full of Second Amendment supporters. In 2021, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt even approved a measure declaring Oklahoma to be a Second Amendment Sanctuary State, which essentially means certain federal gun regulations will be considered an infringement on the rights of citizens.

A 2023 Pew Research survey found Republicans are more than twice as likely as Democrats to personally own a gun; 47 percent of adults living in rural areas report owning a firearm as well, compared to just 20 percent in urban areas.

Harris-Till thinks the presence of ammunition machines in grocery stores exemplifies the pervasiveness of guns in America and the need for stricter regulations. After all, he said, ​​“What situation are you in where you’re like, ‘Oh, I need to get eggs and I need to get ammo?’ ”

American Rounds has plans to expand, with more than 200 stores already contracted to host the machines, Magers said. However, as Yamane pointed out, it’s likely the novelty will wear off and the machines will fade into the plane of near-obscurity alongside ATMs and Amazon Prime deliveries. It will become a new normal—and perhaps that’s the whole point.

“When people got off the boats back in the 17^th century, they were carrying firearms,” Yamane said. “Firearms have always been a part of American culture.”

The Noble Super C Mart is unassuming. The white-brick building sits next to a hardware store and is only a five-minute walk from the Roserock Baptist Church. Outside, the sign reads, “Super C Mart, a hometown tradition.” Bibles and bullets, it seems, are at the heart of that tradition.

The American Rounds vending machine is located at the store’s entrance beside the checkout counters. Next to it is a line of miniature carts made for children to push around the store.

It took less than two minutes for me to hold bullets in my hand—a pack of 12-gauge rifle slugs for $7.50. Four steps to purchase and around six taps of the screen. When prompted, I inserted my driver’s license into the machine and looked up for the camera to scan my face.

I’m 22 years old. I’ve never had gun training. But on that Sunday morning, I held bullets in my hand. Bullets I bought from a grocery-store vendingmachine.

The machine told me to smile to complete the ID verification, which felt really odd when buying ammunition. I also had to stand on my tippy-toes for my face to reach the scanner on the screen. (I’m 5-foot-7, for reference.)

Once my ID and age were verified, the box of ammo dropped into a small compartment that I could open near the bottom of the machine. I admit I grabbed the box as quickly as I could and got the hell out of there. It’s not that I was afraid of the machine or bullets, but how I may be perceived for buying them.

I grew up with guns. Not in my hand or openly in my home—but in the media. In the minutes that passed on the classroom clock while I waited for the “all clear” to sound through the overhead speakers. In the tears I cried for people I’d never met but who were tragically lost.

I know these machines likely won’t lead to more violence. In fact, if brick-and-mortar and online ammunition purchases (where age and ID checks aren’t a guarantee) were replaced with these machines, violence may even be reduced. But, as Yamane told me, sometimes it’s not about the gun (or the machine) itself, but what it represents.

To me, these machines are yet another reminder of how normalized guns are in America. I’m not against the Second Amendment. I understand there is a time and place where guns are necessary. But I’m also part of the generation asking desperately for stricter regulations so maybe, just maybe, we won’t have to run, hide, fight anymore.

I’m 22 years old. I’ve never had gun training. But on that Sunday morning, I held bullets in my hand. Bullets I bought from a grocery-store vending machine. Later, I left the store with a box of bullets and a bag of egg noodles (might as well cross that off my list while I was there, right?). As I walked through the parking lot to my car, I couldn’t suppress the feeling that I had just evaded some incredibly faulty security measures, because surely it can’t be that easy to buy bullets?

But it was. So very easy.

The box now sits on a shelf at the back of my bedroom closet. I’ll probably never touch it again, but I’ll remember it’s there—a reminder of the inseparable nature of the land of the free and a gun.