(UK poster here - living away from the riots though, thankfully)

There was apparently a decently large group of Turkish business owners in London last night who got together with baseball bats to protect their businesses (which apparently worked).

I'd say it's a bit of both.

After seeing Korean shopowners in action during the LA riots in 1991, I'd always been curious how this scenario would play out in a country with gun control laws.

I suspect many of these will be for home owners in these affected areas. Remember that whilst the shops are being targeted, that there are often many people cowering behind locked doors hoping that this will come to an end. This is a just a means of protection for them, should they need it. In the UK people are not allowed to own fire arms, but baseball bats are a different thing altogether.

I would guess that many, if not a majority of the rioters lack a credit card, and quite possibly a registered permanent address for deliveries. These are people on the farthest margins of society, often with very little to lose.

Rioters don't buy things, they steal them.

Surely rioters? I find it hard to believe a shop owner is seriously going to try and hold the line by themselves against a mob. Also, a baseball bat is a classic disguised weapon but a shopkeeper will have no justification in having one so it is probably an offensive weapon in UK law.

I've heard it said that D-cell Maglite torches are used by security guards not because they necessarily need a torch (a headtorch is generally more useful anyway), but because it can be carried and justified legally.