MEXICO CITY — Exclusive clothing stores line Avenida Presidente Masarik here. A Burberry coat? A Corneliani suit? A Gucci scarf? Have enough pesos, and they are yours.

But tucked on a leafy side street in the Polanco neighborhood is a shop unlike the others: Miguel Caballero, named after its Colombian owner, where all the garments are bulletproof.

There are bulletproof leather jackets and bulletproof polo shirts. Armored guayabera shirts hang next to protective windbreakers, parkas and even white ruffled tuxedo shirts. Every member of the sales staff has had to take a turn being shot while wearing one of the products, which range from a few hundred dollars to as much as $7,000, so they can attest to the efficacy of the secret fabric.

“It feels like a punch,” a salesman said of the shot to the stomach he received.

As Mexico grapples with an increase in drug-related violence, sales are steadily on the rise, the company said, though it declined to provide precise figures.

Just who is willing to fork over thousands of dollars for these chic shields?

There is the surgeon who finishes work at the hospital late and feels vulnerable while walking through the parking lot to his car. There is the bullfighter who is scared not of bulls but of bullets and consequently ordered a matador’s suit that can withstand gunfire.

Then there are Mexican politicians and business executives, some of whom have received threats and others of whom want to supplement their existing security measures, which in many cases already include bulletproof cars, home alarm systems, round-the-clock bodyguards and panic buttons. To some, bulletproof fashion is the logical next step.

All because there is a whole lot of shooting going on in Mexico today. Every day, the papers are full of victims with bullet wounds. Some are garden-variety crime victims, but the drug cartels are behind the overwhelming majority.

Studies have shown that more and more anxious Mexicans are pouring their money into defensive measures, spending $18 billion in private security measures, a recent study by the Center for Economic Studies of the Private Sector found.