As of this morning, our cheapest gas in the Alachua County, FL area is $3/gal. - up from $1.09/gal. two years ago. Gilchrist is a little lower for now. I didn't drive through Levy this morning, there was an accident I wanted to avoid, but the stations I pass along that route have crept back up to $3/gal. or just shy of it. The Gatorville Bass Pro is still out of primers, powders, bullets and has limited supplies of ammo. But they are still in business which surprises me a little. The greasy hippies and anti-American flag burners haven't driven them out, yet. LGS's to me gave up on stocking reloading supplies after the Y2K insanity. It just wasn't worth the complaints and hassles. The indoor range & gun store near Marion County had CCI LPP in stock for $129.99/K on Saturday - I bought a brick - but they ran out by Monday. They also had some limited powders on-hand for pre-plandemic prices, mostly. I bought a pound of W244 and a pound of True Blue. But those guys have been beating the bushes for anything they could get at any price, from any distributor, then marking it up 2-3% at most. Anybody complaining about them trying to make cost is going to drive them out of stocking reloading supplies, too, and has my enmity for doing it.
That's one of the first trends I spotted over a year ago and posted about on THR many times: the shortages and surpluses have been regional. Even within the states, some cities are well stocked but go down the interstate a couple of hours and they haven't seen a primer in over a year, can't get any in. These supply snafu's were regional from the beginning, will be regional until the end - whenever that is - and the online marketplaces are taking advantage of the regionality of the supply chains. Stories about, "I got plenty, all of our stores have plenty, there is no problem," are examples of Ostrich, head-in-the-sand thinking. Will some areas see lower prices? Yes. Will it be across the board and national? No. Will prices fall to what they were? No. For one thing, inflation effects reloading supplies just like any other commodity. For another thing, the value of the dollar has fallen - $30 in 2018 isn't worth $30 in 2021, it's only worth $27.98; distribute that change in value across the entire raw materials-retail display supply chain and you start to see the whole picture - the cost of shipping has increased substantially, and the cost of labor has risen - all by mandate and policy, not the natural process of supply-and-demand.
Sunshine and hope are nice. Hold onto them while you can; but, prepare for stormy times ahead and don't count on sunshine forever.
