Anyone else experiencing this?

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KimberUltra

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At a few of my local stores there is no .22lr. You could find some before the holidays but could only buy a box of 100 at a time. Now you can't find any. .223 seems to be in abundance which is odd to me. 30-06 is in abundance, and .308 is scarce but you can still get the NATO stuff. .308 has been scarce since newtown. I'm not as familiar with the availability of .270 win but there seems to be a decent amount of that too.

Maybe it's just my area but I find it odd that the .308 shortage has lasted a lot longer than the .223 shortage.

Kinda puts a damper in things since I want to purchase a remington 700 in 308.

Anyone else having kind of odd availabilities?
 
The Lawton Wal-Mart on Quanah Parker had 500 round cartons of 7.62mm yesterday. The price was $379. There was no .22 LR or 9mm on the shelves.
 
Handgun calibers are equally as confusing. Most common calibers are usually gone with the exception of some oscure hollow point or defense round. Good luck finding a box of 50 or 100 9mm or 45.

The prices on things isn't bad tho. The 22 was 8.99 for 100 which is fine with me. I'm newer to guns so most of my experience with prices has been mid shortage.
 
Locally it's a hit or miss proposition.
Sometimes one FFL will have literally "skid loads" of .223's. Uncle Wallys has a weekly supply of 9mm stuff, but it's quickly sold out. Rifle ammo shelves are bare as people see boxes of .270, .30 -'06, .308. .25-'06 etc, and in a panic mode buy the limit of 3 boxes each.
The .22 rimfire ammo is non-existant except for an occassional find at a big box store like Dick's. VERY expensive though!
I reload and my supply of rifle ammo is fine and I can shoot my .38's to my hearts content.
I bought a 100 pack of Winchester 9mm ammo for $28.00 at Wally World and I thought the price somewhat reasonable.
 
I have most of a case of 22RF I bought before the supply dried up. I'll need to ration myself for the 22 plate shoot season.
It's to the point where I can almost reload 45ACP cheaper than buying 22RF.
 
I'm just frustrated. Wanting to buy guns but they ed up being safe queens because you can't find ammo. I have around 1000 rounds for my 10/22 but I don't wanna start shooting that up. And buying a several hundred dollar rifle that I can't find ammo for would piss me off. It's bad enough I got to drive 3-6 hours up north to shoot anything past 100 yards.
 
The small gun store near my house has had only two bricks of 22LR (Remington) since the shortage started.

Twice while I was at the store a young and older couple bought a .380 for the wife's protection. When asked about ammo the store manager told them he didn't have any and we couldn't tell they where they could find any.
I felt sorry for them. I drove home, got a couple boxes of .380 and gave it to them.

Last Monday I gave my Doctor 2,100 rounds of 22LR so his boy has something to shoot.

I usually don't buy factory ammo but I go by the gun counter whenever I'm in Wal Mart. All they ever have is very little rifle ammo and never any 22LR.
 
That's awesome of you. Made their days. It's rough. My friends both just got their permits but they are stumped when it comes to a pistol to buy. Almost any guns they buy will be more useful as a tomahawk than a firearm.
 
My local BassPro had a rack fill of Federal Auotmatch last week. 325 rounds for $19.00. I bought a box just to keep my supply up in case the grandkids come down.
 
The Wallys around here are still bare when it comes to .22lr and 9mm. But if you need .40 or .45 ACP you can find it. .223 is available but more than I'm willing to spend right now and I can reload for at least another 5,000 rounds. .308 is available but again with that price I can reload for at least another 2,000 rounds.

To me .308 just isn't that popular and thus why it's going the way of .30-06 in the price department because it's still sought after but it doesn't move the volume that .223 does. For a neutered .30-06 it's kind of surprising to me that folks use it in bolt guns as I only use it semis but to each one's own, I've got an AK variant in .243 Winchester (use Galil .308 mags).

I think it will take awhile for .308 to catchup with supply as most manufacturers are still seeing a high ROR on .223 focused production which will hopefully mellow out eventually by May or June. I'm focused on reloading supplies for 8mm and 7.62x54r for the time being as I'm getting awesome results with certain handloads from my Mosins and Mausers. Eventually I'll get back to .308 and .223 supplies but not anytime soon.

Get what you can get at Wallys and skip the LGS if you can, let the market sort itself out till the prices are more desirable then visit the LGS but not before.
 
The continued .22lr shortage is vexing for sure. I go to the range and hear/see fewer people shooting .22 than ever. Now, my personal experience is a small sample size, but I, for one, don't believe for a second that the rate of actual consumption (use) of .22lr has gone up. Unless one buys some sort of conspiracy theory wherein the manufacturers are lying about .22lr being made as fast as their machinery will go, there must be huge inventories/stockpiles of this stuff building up somewhere.

If one were watching a commodity market, one might be tempted to conclude that the biggest speculators in the commodity are so committed to their position that they have to keep buying in order to prevent the total collapse of the value of their hoard.

Of course, it's also possibility that all shooters have gone from thinking a 500-round stash is plenty to wanting a 5,000 round stash. And when they hit 5,000 and still can't buy at will, then they adjust their "need" to a 10,000 round stash. So they continue buying, but not shooting, which further propagates the shortage.

Some Ph.D. economics candidate could get a fascinating dissertation out of this market behavior. Interesting, complex dynamics going on.

None of which lets me shoot .22lr as much or as often as I want. :banghead:
 
My local WM finally stocked four 1K rnd boxes of .22LR yesterday after having none for over a week. The first customer in line took three and the next took the last box. Funny how there's NEVER any line at the ammo counter until .22LR comes in. Gee... I wonder how they know it's there.
 
We can only buy 100 at a time and you need to flash your pistol permit. Very few stores are shipping to CT anymore too. So the numbers of people flocking to the storesfor ammo is way up.
 
I also noticed the rimfire situation getting better and then worse again (though a little earlier than your time period for both) but we are tripping over .308/7.62 here in AZ.

I suspect it is very regional.

Mike
 
it's also possibility that all shooters have gone from thinking a 500-round stash is plenty to wanting a 5,000 round stash. And when they hit 5,000 and still can't buy at will, then they adjust their "need" to a 10,000 round stash. So they continue buying, but not shooting, which further propagates the shortage.
Click to expand...

^^ This ^^

We've become our own worst enemy when it comes to the availability of .22LR ammo. I haven't purchased any in over a year but I have not shot any in over a year. I'm willing to bet that the huge cache of .22 ammo is in storage by millions of shooters who got caught short this time around. It's not being shot much from what I see.
 
Went into LGS for first time in a month or so today. Found them fully stocked on bulk Federal .22LR. Scored 3 50 rnd boxes of CCI SV at $3.50 a box and a 525 rnd box of Federal Champion for $29.99. I think the situation is improving quite a bit here.
 
22 is still much like a unicorn around my parts I did pick up 150 rounds of Winchester 9mm NATO for 40 bucks tho :D
 
These are strange times we live in. I've never seen a shortage this long and broad.In the last 18 months, I've seen 5 50rnd boxes of .22lr at WalMart for $1.98 a box. I reload my center fire calibers so I don't know what the ammo situation for CF is.
 
I'm just frustrated. Wanting to buy guns but they ed up being safe queens because you can't find ammo. I have around 1000 rounds for my 10/22 but I don't wanna start shooting that up. And buying a several hundred dollar rifle that I can't find ammo for would piss me off. It's bad enough I got to drive 3-6 hours up north to shoot anything past 100 yards.
Click to expand...

Gotta stock up while its there to buy. Some of us haven't even noticed the shortage.
 
.22 lr ammo is available around here but it is VERY expensive. $2.99 for a box of 50 standard velocity American Eagle. Limit of two boxes.

9mm is hit or miss, as most of the big box stores get a few boxes a week, but it is gone quickly.

When my daughter went to qualify for her CHL, she wanted to use one of my .45's. I had to give her a box of milsurp ammo to shoot as we could not find any .45 ammo on the shelves anywhere. And in Texas you are not supposed to shoot reloaded ammo for CHL qualification.

Her CHL instructor said that it has become a real problem finding ammo for qualification.
 
km101 said:
.22 lr ammo is available around here but it is VERY expensive. $2.99 for a box of 50 standard velocity American Eagle. Limit of two boxes.
Click to expand...

LOL! That's about half, a quarter, or a tenth of the going rate around here.
 
I had alerts on three different kinds of .22 LR in stock at Midway today. As usual, I was too late to get any. Folks getting alerts and ordering on smart phones are killing me. :)
 
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