Shootings give rise to bullet-resistant backpacks
New York — Companies like Guard Dog Security, TuffyPacks and Bullet Blocker are peddling bullet-resistant backpacks for children in time for the back-to-school shopping season. But critics argue they are using tragedy as a marketing opportunity and exploiting parents’ worst fears.
Safety is high on the minds of parents, especially after two back-to-back mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, that left 31 people dead.
“Times have changed,” said Yasir Sheikh, founder and president of Skyline USA, which makes Guard Dog Security products like pepper spray and stun guns and started offering bullet-resistant backpacks called ProShield Scout for children last year. “Our product is in response to that. It’s a sad reality.”
Sheikh said the backpacks are very popular and sold out several times after the Parkland, Fla., school shooting that left 17 people dead in 2018.
Steve Naremore founded Houston-based TuffyPacks in late 2015 after his daughter, a fourth-grade teacher, told him about the frequency of active shooting drills for her students. His company produces some bullet-resistant backpacks but the bulk of his business is in removable ballistic shields that are inserted in backpacks.
Naremore says his backpacks could be the difference between suffering “lethal versus nonlethal” injuries. “It acts as a defensive shield,” he said, noting sales of the shields tripled in the days after the mass shooting at a Walmart store in El Paso.
But some question the motives behind such companies. “The only people enjoying it are the people selling the backpacks,” says Ponnell Scroggins of Milwaukee, a father of six kids, ages 3 to 14. “They’re making plenty of money right now. And they’re doing it off of something that was very unfortunate.”
And the backpacks don’t come cheap. TuffyPacks’ shields range in price from $129 to $149. Skyline’s ProShield Scout backpacks are priced at $119, although it’s less than the adult version that tops at $199.
Some also cast doubt on the backpacks’ safety and how much they can really protect children.