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Brewster11
PostPosted: Tue Nov 16, 2021 9:15 pm  Reply with quote



Joined: 08 Feb 2009
Posts: 1301
Location: Western WA

Quote:
You can’t find any ammo because demand is still outstripping supply.

Yes that is obviously true, but WHY is demand outstripping supply so severely? It’s not happening with ANY other consumer commodity today. Are shooters the worst of all hoarders, so much that only them, and no others, willingly and eagerly exhaust their market supply?

I don’t think so.

Can there be THAT MANY hoarders, or might some of them be straw buyers for people with infinitely deep pockets? Or are the manufacturers shipping the lions share of product to Mexico, or overseas?

Are bullet manufacturers so uniquely incompetent businessman that only their industry among thousands of others is utterly incapable of balancing output and pricing to maintain adequate retail stocks? I hardly think so.

Something else is going on. It is a mystery to me.

Go to the bullet manufacturers web sites. With a scant handful of exceptions, ALL the center fire bullets are OUT OF STOCK. How could that possibly be? How many people could possibly need to hoard long range center fire MATCH bullets or any of the multitude of other highly specialized oddball bullet types that only a small clutch of shooters might use? They are ALL unavailable. It makes absolutely no sense.

B.
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Riflemeister
PostPosted: Wed Nov 17, 2021 8:47 am  Reply with quote
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Hoarders are one thing, but speculators may be the major problem. If a group of people can figure out a way to take control of the supply of an item, they can then dictate the cost of that item. Take the popular 6.5 Creedmoor ammo for example. All the usual retailers are out of stock on the Creedmoor, but go to the Gunbroker website and there is no shortage at all, just ridiculously high prices. I would say that there are speculators at work taking advantage of this ammo shortage and exacerbating the situation.

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kgb
PostPosted: Wed Nov 17, 2021 10:55 am  Reply with quote
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Riflemeister wrote:
Hoarders are one thing, but speculators may be the major problem. If a group of people can figure out a way to take control of the supply of an item, they can then dictate the cost of that item. Take the popular 6.5 Creedmoor ammo for example. All the usual retailers are out of stock on the Creedmoor, but go to the Gunbroker website and there is no shortage at all, just ridiculously high prices. I would say that there are speculators at work taking advantage of this ammo shortage and exacerbating the situation.


I agree with this. A friend who works at a local shop told me of their getting in a shipment of powder and helping one customer load up $3,000 worth. I doubt he was just catching up on his own personal supply although anything's possible. End result is the same, shelves empty quickly.

What is the human condition if not searching for a way to make a buck the quickest, easiest way possible? Our hobby isn't immune from that happening to it, especially if the results can be quite braggable.

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Brewster11
PostPosted: Fri Nov 19, 2021 10:28 am  Reply with quote



Joined: 08 Feb 2009
Posts: 1301
Location: Western WA

NOTE FOR 16GADAVIS

I received your PM but system will not allow me to reply for some reason. My response is YES thank you, PM me with further instructions.

Thanks
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16gaDavis
PostPosted: Fri Nov 19, 2021 11:38 am  Reply with quote



Joined: 24 Jun 2013
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B11 - got your note , it can be tricky to tell whether it went thru - it DID !! Reply sent , just need mailing address .

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Dave in Maine
PostPosted: Sat Nov 20, 2021 12:54 pm  Reply with quote



Joined: 12 Sep 2010
Posts: 1972
Location: Maine

Part of the problem with hunting ammo is that the manufacturers went to make home defense ammo first. My local Walmart has plenty of 7.62x51 FMJ but no .308 150gr PSP. Ditto Cabela's. The big rush on ammo was last year, when all anyone wanted was 9mm, 45 ACP, .223 and .308. With workforces limited by corona they made what they could make. In the case of Remington, their shelves were bare of raw material because of their bankruptcy, atop the worker shortage.

In concentrating on home defense ammo (which is where all the buckshot came from) the manufacturers did not make hunting ammo. And now the shelves are bare.

As to why Hornady is the only one able o get product on the shelves, I dunno. Maybe they kept a bigger stock of materials? Maybe they didn't cancel orders for materials? No one is saying.

But hoarders, I'm sure, have a lot to do with it.

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Pine Creek/Dave
PostPosted: Sat Nov 20, 2021 2:37 pm  Reply with quote



Joined: 17 Mar 2017
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DaveinMaine,

Ok I agree for the most part with your analysis, however when companies like RST and Polywad can not get components to make their specialty shells there is a bigger problem than the Covid explanation. I am not saying I understand what the problem is however. In my opinion all the manufacturers should be caught up with their supplies by this time. If the component companies were supplying enough materials there would be no problem for RST & Polywad supplying their shells to the general public. Having sold my MEC I am starting to believe it was a mistake to do so. I do not believe hoarding has a lot to due with the inventory shortage, where good shotgun shells are concerned.

all the best,

Pine Creek/Dave
L.C. Smith Man

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Dave in Maine
PostPosted: Sat Nov 20, 2021 4:07 pm  Reply with quote



Joined: 12 Sep 2010
Posts: 1972
Location: Maine

RST definitely gets their hulls from Cheddite. I believe Polywad does, too. RST gets their hulls already primed.

Cheddite does not make hulls in the USA. Rather, they make their hulls and wads in a plant in Livorno, Italy. They also load the shells at that plant. From their site https://www.chedditeitaly.it/lo-stabilimento-di-livorno/?lang=en :

Quote:
The Cheddite factory in Livorno, surrounded by the beautiful Tuscan countryside, covers a total area of 50 hectares and focuses on the production of two important components, wads and base wads, and on the loading of shooting and hunting cartridges of every type and size: 12, 16, 20, 24, 28, 32, 36 and 410.


Cheddite makes their primers in France.

So, the hulls RST and Polywad need to load the shells have to be shipped from Europe to he US, then to the American companies' plants, then be loaded there. And, if the American companies don't have all the components (remember - wad-suitable plastic was in short supply earlier this year) they can't load shells.

Add to that heavy buyer demand and ... you get empty shelves.

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Frederick Douglass, November 15, 1867, speech in Williamsport, Pa.
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