Temporary shortage?

I guess people define what the definition of "is" is differently.

With Biden vowing to eliminate internet sales of anything gun related, these shortages are more likely permanent

Who has been saying "temporary"? This seems much worse than the Obama year fiascos. Already low production from plants due to Covid. Very much not temporary.

George P said:

With Biden vowing to eliminate internet sales of anything gun related, these shortages are more likely permanent

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Or lasting for at least the next 4 years

George P said:

With Biden vowing to eliminate internet sales of anything gun related, these shortages are more likely permanent

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The possible ban on internet sales would hurt and would be a step backwards for us. But remember that places like Midway, Cabalas, Sinclair/Brownells and several others did business through the mail long before the internet. And if I need to I can get together with a few shooting buddies and get a big enough order to make driving to Powder Valley in Kansas feasible.

No doubt, we have rough times ahead of us!

Banning internet sales basically means no out-of-state sales. Here on the west coast, you can’t buy ammunition from an out of state vendor unless it is shipped to an FFL or licensed ammunition dealer. That also means you can’t drive to another state to purchase it and then bring it home without risking prosecution.

I assume that the ban the Dems are considering will be written in similar fashion.

packetloss said:

The other way to look at this is that what folks think are regular prices aren't permanent either. A better description for how ammo/reloading supplies seem to work is that they are cyclical. Given that these cyclical events keep repeating...

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Yes they repeat. And thats what puzzles me. All shooters who have been in this game for more than 5 years should know that panics and shortages happen. Knowing that why don't reloaders have thousands of primers, bullets and cases on hand? Why don't reloaders have several pounds of powder on hand? And if you don't reload why don't you have cases of ammo for your guns? If shooters had of properly stocked up before hand there wouldn't be the crisis we are looking at now. It would only be the brand new shooters who were buying ammo and ammo would most likely be sitting on the shelf right now.

ThomasT said:

Yes they repeat. And thats what puzzles me. All shooters who have been in this game for more than 5 years should know that panics and shortages happen. Knowing that why don't reloaders have thousands of primers, bullets and cases on hand? Why don't reloaders have several pounds of powder on hand? And if you don't reload why don't you have cases of ammo for your guns? If shooters had of properly stocked up before hand there wouldn't be the crisis we are looking at now. It would only be the brand new shooters who were buying ammo and ammo would most likely be sitting on the shelf right now.

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When this shortage started I went and bought 4 years worth of ammo, basically doubling my ready supply for practice. Now, 80 % of that was moving to .22lr from 9mm for 80 % of practice and that was because of the possibility that this situation could last far longer than the next 4 years. If Georgia goes, then we all go. And I am not sorry I restocked so don't start that.

I believe it’s temporary because of the “perfect storm” we are experiencing. Shortages and order delays because of shutdowns in the spring, coupled with an uptick in sales to new gun owners. Add in the normal election year buy up and lastly all the civil unrest this summer. I thing supplies will get better. How quickly and for how long is anyone’s guess. When I started reloading 7 years ago supplies were mightily thin, maybe worse than now. It all came back. When it comes back I’ll take time to buy and extra box or primers or an extra pound of pounder for a rainy day.

After all if you think about it everything is temporary....

Jeff

SharpDog said:

When this shortage started I went and bought 4 years worth of ammo, basically doubling my ready supply for practice. Now, 80 % of that was moving to .22lr from 9mm for 80 % of practice and that was because of the possibility that this situation could last far longer than the next 4 years. If Georgia goes, then we all go. And I am not sorry I restocked so don't start that.

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Sounds to me like you did it right. I wish others would have followed your lead.

Glass half full.

Temporary. Not permanent.

I'll keep politics aside

I bought 10,000 spp at the beginning of the plandemic and I'm down to 4,000 guess I should have bought more. I have plenty of other components and have added new calibers. My only real issue is getting a reasonable price for primers. If they ever get back near the old price I will need a bigger shed.

packetloss said:

So, everyone keeps calling these ammo/primer/powder/etc shortages temporary. Why do you consider these shortages temporary?

The adjective temporary is used to describe something that isn't permanent or lasts only a short time. Its roots are in the Latin word tempus, meaning "time or season."​

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The key word there is "or". Do you think the shortages are permanent? If not, they're temporary by your own definition.

packetloss said:

but it's not like these things come as a surprise to anyone.

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Anyone who saw it coming and prepared appropriately is not complaining right now...

All the people who think ammo and component manufacturers can just ramp up production over night need to get together and start an ammo manufacturing outfit that will adjust on the fly to the demands of consumers.

Ammo companies are just going to add an extra shift IF they can get components and have employees that can work without Covid issues. It will take a LONG time to catch up, if ever. By the time they invest capital in new plant, it would be well over a year and by then Uncle Joe will do hos best to shut them down.

I was at my local shop today and they were 90% stocked on guns and had plenty of ammo. 9mm was $30 a box and there was a 2 box limit but it was available. .223 was about $.60 per round also and available in 20 to 150 round boxes.

BreechFace said:

I guess people define what the definition of "is" is differently.

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First post nailed it. I'm always asking "What's your idea of cheap, short, not long and not far".

I've been going through these shortages for 20+ years and they are all slightly different but are about 2 years long. I don't think it has been long at all. I do believe this time it will last about 3 years.

My first shortage sent lead shot prices through the roof and it was unobtainable. Prices were $50+ a bag and nowhere to be found. A few months before it was $17-$19. Two short years late I purchased a ton, 80 bags, for $21 a bag.

The die is cast, I'll wait and hope for the best. The only thing I overlooked was bullets for a certain caliber of pistol. All of the rest is OK for a while.

The way I look at it is this:

It's not much different that toilet paper and face masks. People panic, demand increases, which causes a scarcity. That causes more panic buying which only increases the scarcity. It's a vicious downwards spiral. But eventually the "need" is filled and demand drops back closer to normal.

I can recall at least one thread on this site recently, where someone was bragging about running around buying up hundreds of rounds of a popular cartridge for a new rifle they wanted. Good for them. Bad for others. But you know, if you buy a new gun chambered in a new-to-you cartridge, you want a healthy supply of ammo. I'd love to get my hands on a couple hundred rounds of Remington 150gr Corlokts in .308. Not gonna happen any time soon, with or without paying silly prices. Oh well.

packetloss said:

Well, I saw it coming, I'm sitting on over 30K spp and 20lbs of powder, however, I am still complaining a bit. I'm starting to worry that even that won't be enough. Still, I don't want to store more than that, and shouldn't have to. It just puzzles me that the manufacturers wouldn't want the ability to increase production to capitalize on this. I'd much rather be able to walk into my LGS and be able to pick up stuff I need, rather than plan out my ammo usage over the next 6 months and put in backorders now for then. Instead, all the shelves are barren. Even guns are all sold out. I don't think that's healthy for the industry or the consumers that it's feast or famine.

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Because it would take a minimum of 1-2 years to get a lone up and running; then they would need space, employees, raw materials and an administration who has said they want to destroy the industry. That new equipment will have a long operational life and if the demand collapses later like it did, then they are losing a ton of money.

I think cyclical is a very good way to describe this market, both from the point of view of producers and consumers. I'd guess the cycle is 5 to 7 years long on average and the "hard" part of the cycle lasts 1-2 years. From the point of view of the consumer, you need to stock up to last through at least 2 years of tight supply. From the point of view of the producer, would you invest tens of millions of dollars in a new plant that would only really make money 1/3 of the time?

All of this is moot if the gubmint succeeds in killing off the industry.

The current ammo shortage has surprised everyone in the breadth across everything related to firearms. Almost every handgun and shotgun model is unavailable from the national wholesalers. The gun store I work at has not received any appreciable volume of handgun ammunition since last spring. For example, we obtained 10 50rd boxes of .380 two weeks ago, the first .380 in five months. Every handgun and rifle caliber cannot be ordered from our normal suppliers.

Accessories, such as magazines, not available for virtually every model of handgun out there. Gun cases, gun safes, lasers, out of stock. I’ve been tracking auctions in Gunbroker for several handguns. One model, four months had over a hundred active listings, this week, only four. All of the supply of firearms that were gathering dust in gun shops across the country is quickly dwindling.

A local dealer who stocks Liberty Safes normally receives four shipping containers from Liberty each month. Now, they are down to one each month. They’ve resorted to carrying safes made in China, something they had vowed never to do.

Many of the firearms makers produce less than a thousand guns per day (I know from direct experience as a salesperson who had four large gun manufacturers in my portfolio). Consider that a 1000 guns would be allocated to 50 gun wholesalers across the country. Which are then allocated to the hundreds of local gun stores, not to mention the gun volumes that the big box stores and large internet retailers gobble up of that inventory. With the current crazy demand, the average local gun store has been lucky to obtain a handful of new guns each week from ten different wholesalers.

For just one example, every day we have customers come into the store looking for a Taurus Judge. We have not been able to obtain any model of Judge from any source since May. The same for dozens of other handgun models. We be able to obtain just two Mossberg shotguns in the last three months.

I could go on, but I hope I’ve communicated some of the status that I see every day in the business.