Clayton Smiley, owner of Prophet River Firearms, talked about how he got into business as a former teacher in Paradise Valley, along with some of the federal gun law challenges, as a guest presenter at the Rotary Club of Lloydminster’s Monday lunch. Geoff Lee Meridian Source
Clayton Smiley taught high school math and science in Paradise Valley for 15 years, so he knows when things don’t add up.
That includes what he says are unnecessary federal firearms laws that have impacted his Prophet River Firearms business and firearm owners in Lloydminster.
Smiley spoke about the recent legislation and how he got into the business during a presentation at the Rotary Club of Lloydminster’s Monday lunch meeting.
He says what started as a home-based business selling imported firearms from the United States online while he still teaching, morphed into his first downtown store in 2010.
Today, Prophet River operates out of a new 11,000 sq. ft. storefront at 4206 66 Ave. in Lloydminster with a restricted list of what they’re allowed to sell to customers.
“At this point, we are pretty much limited to hunting rifles and shotguns as well as firearms used for competition shooting since the handgun ban came into being a couple of years ago,” said Smiley.
“That was a big chunk of our sales and not just the guns themselves, but the ammunition and all the stuff that goes with them including sights and all kinds of stuff.”
In 2020, the federal government banned assault rifles after a gunman from New Brunswick killed 22 people and injured three others using an illegally acquired AR-15 rifle.
Smiley told Rotary assault rifles are actually fully automatic rifles, which Canada banned in the 1970s, “so they are not quite being honest” as he put it, noting the AR-15 is semi-automatic.
The ban also added 1,500 models of assault-style firearms to the prohibited list, including some hunting rifles.
Smiley says because the mass shooting in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia is the only documented crime in Canada with an illegal AR-15 rifle the ban, “essentially solves a problem that doesn’t exist.”
Smiley is also frustrated by Bill C-21, which puts a national freeze on the sale, purchase or transfer of handguns by individuals within Canada, and bringing newly acquired handguns into Canada.
“They’ve essentially made someone’s legally owned property worthless,” said Smiley, as registered handguns can only be sold or transferred to exempted individuals or businesses.
Despite the business challenges, Prophet River has grown to its current staff of 28 full-time employees and a handful of part-timers thanks to a strong mail-order division.
“We ship parcels all over the country,” said Smiley.
“What makes us stand out is we carry things not everybody has. We have a bit of a niche with some high-end and some unusual firearms and we are well stocked.
“Over the years, we’ve accumulated quite a clientele. We have a full-time shipping department.”
Some of his long-time employees are former students Smiley taught when he and his wife lived in Paradise Valley and in Lloyd, where he learned how to import firearms from the U.S.
Smiley’s story begins in Nova Scotia where he was born and raised and acquired a couple of university degrees that landed him a teaching job in the Northwest Territories when he was 25.
He would spend his summers studying for a master’s degree at the University of Calgary close to his two brothers who lived in the city.
After teaching for four years in the NWT, he accepted a job in Paradise Valley and the rest is history except for the part where he quit teaching and founded Prophet River Holdings which operates in Lloyd as Prophet River Firearms.
