Ammo Shortage News Update

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I’m well stocked and like many others here, I’ve cut back on range time until things ease market wise. This past Saturday I went to my club range for the first time this year with some friends, one of which, a retired Navy jet pilot, was visiting from Virginia. I would have probably held off on going if it had not been for the camaraderie of friends. Something that due to circumstances, has been in a drought but with better days ahead.
 
One other thing....if people are not hoarding they (+ all the new shooters) should be shooting. They are not..bullets are not going down range.

My club has 1000+ members. Say 150 are "active shooters" 1 1/2 years ago there were 3 or 4 shooters there at any given time. Usually more. Today..you might find one there. Usually me.. That is statisticallyt relevant. There are several gun clubs in my area. I only am very familiar with one other. It is crickets allso.

So Astro..who is shooting all these bullets? Not new shooters or old shooters....aliens???
 
Gun clubs here are very active. 2 hour wait for a lane last Saturday morning at my local range, unless you were a member, with a reservation.

I had a reservation. We tried out my friend's new Daniel Defense pistol, and she tried out my AR and my Daniel Defense .300 BLK.

Sent quite a few down range, in various calibers, but we weren't the only ones. Every lane was full. Every lane was sending them.

There were dozens of people in line to buy firearms, dozens and dozens more waiting for their turn on the range, with a buzzer in their hand.

Different experience than yours. Perhaps the PA folks with whom you're associating are hoarders, I can't say, but a lot of folks down here are shooters.

In casual conversation with many shooters, they bought their ammo previously, at reasonable prices. Many others bought their ammo that day, at crazy prices, precisely because they wanted to shoot. I see an interesting mix of experienced shooters and relatively new shooters.

It may also be that the folks at your range failed to stock up when ammo was cheap, have no ammo, and don’t want to buy it at the current, inflated prices. So, with no ammo on hand, they don’t shoot.

You presume that your anecdotal observation, at your one club/range, is universally true. I assure you that it’s not. In the shooting community here, not that far away, across multiple ranges and stores, it is very different. People are buying ammo, and shooting it.
 
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The buddy from Virginia I mentioned was surprised that there were only the four of us on the pistol range and only one shooter on the rifle range. He said the same thing that you did about how crowded his club range was in Virginia.
 
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I think you are all right, it is all of the things mentioned here together. I know a number of real gun guys (of which I'd be considered one by most people) who are sitting on a load of ammo but still relentlessly seek and buy more. There are others who are fairly well stocked (me included) who are sitting it out and limiting range time. I have been approached by multiple new shooters who are looking for a gun, ammo or both. I've had more people ask me from out of left field if I had a gun or ammo for sale in the last year than my whole lifetime prior.

Then there are the merchants, the variance in some pricing tells you quite a bit.

I am seeing more ammo than 6 months ago and prices have come down a little bit. Good sign but this is far from over.
 
The reason we have shortages today is that demand (along with commodity prices) are very cyclical. Combine that with the extreme cost of capacity expansion, and manufacturers are very unwilling to invest a ton of $$$ to massively develop more production when they know those lines will be sitting idle in a few years when demand goes back down. They would rather run their existing facilities 24/7 and make big profits than make big investments that wont pay off down the road.
 
I have about 2000 rounds of 9mm range ammo, shooting only 100 rounds at a time during my range visits every 4-6 weeks. It sucks but it's livable for the next one.5/two years or so if necessary. Can't enjoy the hobby if you don't actually shoot.
 
Anyone "hording" ammo at today's prices is hard up for ammo. People who don't have any stock may buy at today's inflated prices, but they aren't going to buy 10 times more than they need in the name of hording. Real horders do it when the price is low, that way they don't have to buy it when the price is super high.
 
i doubt people are hoarding ammo at the current price. i think its just people buying 100 or 200 rounds at a time multiplied by all the new shooters. i find it interesting that gun sales are still going nuts even with the price of ammo.

i too see commodity ammo like 9mm coming back in stock and dropping slightly. once everyone get their fill and the political situation stabilizes , it should come done . How long that will take is anyone guess

i have 10k rounds of my reloads so i will be good for a while. you might think this is a lot, but i play the gun games and used to burn 1k rounds a month just at matches and more in practice. in a normal year in the past i would burn 10 - 15 k in 9mm a year
 
The buddy from Virginia I mentioned was surprised that there were only the four of us on the pistol range and only one shooter on the rifle range. He said the same thing that you did about how crowded his club range was in Virginia.

I know a number of real gun guys (of which I'd be considered one by most people) who are sitting on a load of ammo but still relentlessly seek and buy more.
Yea.. that's what I see. "If you see it buy it"

My prediction if nothing major happens is: Year's end 9mm- 40 cents. .22- 12 to 14 cents. I am good til Sept. I hope to have 3 training sessions with 200+ rounds.of 9mm. .22- I shoot 5 or 6 times/ week 10 rounds strong hand 10 rounds week hand. 10 rounds 2 handed. Dry firing/drawing 4 or 5 times/week. For me its just a matter of training. I don't shoot any more for "target/sport" No point to it (for me)
 
i am mostly a rimfire shooter: i physically enjoy it, i can reliably hit with it, i’m cheap. i loaded up on rimfire at decent prices after the obama era, so i’m ok now. i offloaded almost all centerfire firearms recently, so even though i don’t have alot of centerfire ammo, i am good with what ammo stock i have for what very few pieces i retained. i also mostly shoot single action revolvers these days in both rimfire and just very occasionally in centerfire calibers. single action slows the ammo burn rate and forces me to concentrate on aim and pleasure, like sipping a fine, expensive whiskey. finally, nothing 20th-21st century tactical or over ten round capacity.
 
Yea.. that's what I see. "If you see it buy it"

My prediction if nothing major happens is: Year's end 9mm- 40 cents. .22- 12 to 14 cents. I am good til Sept. I hope to have 3 training sessions with 200+ rounds.of 9mm. .22- I shoot 5 or 6 times/ week 10 rounds strong hand 10 rounds week hand. 10 rounds 2 handed. Dry firing/drawing 4 or 5 times/week. For me its just a matter of training. I don't shoot any more for "target/sport" No point to it (for me)
Sounds like me. I got a single action Ruger Wrangler to conserve Ammo and still enjoy shooting during this drought.
 
I was driving through the south Mississippi today and decided to get an ammo box at Walmart. I walked right past this ammo. A young employee saw me looking through the shooting aisle and told me about the store just getting ammo in stock. If a very isolated Walmart like this is starting to get ammo, stores in your area may be as well.
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And wait to find some. I’m just fine.

it will come back down... or not... but I’m not going to bank on 70c being the new normal when stores can’t even keep stock on shelves...
Some said ammo prices would stay high after Newtown. Once between Newtown and now I bought several cases of bulk pack Remington Thunderbolts for 2.3c round. No, not top of the line .22 but good enough for punching holes in cans. Also still have a few cases of 17c 9mm
 
Pretty much anything firearm related today is made of unobtainium, for two reasons:
- high demand due to the initialization of CVD19 panic buying, which has now morphed into residual desire in folks who previously had no interest; these are the same folks who bought so much toilet paper last year that it's stocked on shelves in their basement or garage, but still buy more rather than use what they have ...
- low supply due to commodity shortages (this is a world-wide issue currently ongoing). My industry (HVAC) has seen production shutdowns due to low steel supply; so has my wife's industry (material handling systems). I have friends in other manufacturing industries and they are seeing production shutdowns due to a lack of product supply in glass, plastics, etc. I'm sure we're all aware of the Ford SuperDuty trucks stacked up everywhere around Louisville and the surrounding counties due to electronics in critically short supply.

The ammo shortage is just a small cog in the giant commodity-sensitive wheel, and the entire world is going to have a slow recovery from this issue.
 
Remington went belly up and their factories were shut down. They have since been bought and they are in the process of getting everything back up and running. I think I read that there were 2 million new gun owners last year because of the crap going on, and they all want ammo. Not sure how much COVID had to do with it too, but those things have created a perfect storm for a while.
I know someone who owns a large gun shop and he said that they have orders for ammo in and they never know when they are going to be delivered or what it is going to be. The truck just shows up and they get whatever is in the shipment and it is gone in a day or 2.
 
I went to Walmart in Caldwell yesterday to look for some jeans and the cruise through the oil section and the ammo section showed me the whole ammo cabinet was bare as bare could be.
 
I went to Walmart in Caldwell yesterday to look for some jeans and the cruise through the oil section and the ammo section showed me the whole ammo cabinet was bare as bare could be.
I don't think Wal-Mart is really trying to stock ammo anymore. They quit carrying any ammo that could be used in a pistol a couple years ago after the wal-mart shooting in Texas (I think?) They still have .22LR, though? They are caving to any pressure for anything lately for fear of being cancelled. I think you also have to be 21 to buy ammo from them.
 
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