In DeLand, get a free bang with your bling

A downtown shop in DeLand, Florida is offering a holiday deal combining the key components for a shotgun wedding.

The combined jewellery and gun retail stores are giving away a free shotgun to customers who buy select pieces of jewellery.

The jewellery in the deal is priced from $450 to $4,000 and the shotgun is worth about $270, according to Jessie Czerok, who owns both businesses - Downtown Goldsmith Jewelry & Engraving and 2nd Amendment Firearms - with husband Nick.

This is the third year of the Christmas special, Czerok said, and while she knows the shotgun wedding joke, it doesn't exactly apply here because it's not necessarily the father of the bride getting the shotgun.

''We just kind of took that and then changed it around,'' she said.

The deal is also available for Valentine's Day, with the same requirements in place for receiving the shotgun as buying one, including a background check.

''Everybody just thinks it's … I don't want to say it's funny, but it is," said Wayne Carter, executive director of the MainStreet DeLand Association. "It's interesting. It's something that's an attention-getter.''

Czerok said the jewellery store at 139 N. Woodland Blvd has been around for 14 years, and the gun side of the shop started in 2012.

''The guys were like, 'Oh, this is great. I can get my wife to come into a gun store' and the girls were like, 'Oh this is great. I can get my husband in the jewellery store,''' she said.

Such gender stereotypes don't apply in the Czerok family; both Jessie and Nick are gun enthusiasts and Nick is the shop's jeweller.

While recent mass shootings have stirred the national debate about gun use in America, Nick Czerok said he hasn't gotten any negative response about the shotgun offer, adding that Volusia County is very pro-gun.

Others chose their words carefully when discussing the deal.

Tracey Baumgartner, who owns downtown's Deja Vu furniture and home decor store, said that any unique marketing idea gets attention.

''I'm not saying it's good or bad," she said. "They say attention's attention, whether it's good or bad.''

Jessica Johnson, a 22-year-old DeLand resident walking by the business recently thought the idea was quirky but wasn't interested because she doesn't use shotguns.

''I think it's kind of fun,'' she said.

Carter said the offer could help the shop stand out among other jewellery stores.

''This thing here is just making his little niche stand out," he said. "It's going to appeal to who it appeals to.''

The supply of free shotguns is limited, Nick Czerok said, adding that the business has given away eight shotguns as of Monday afternoon since the deal started on the last day of November.