Interesting article on the ammo shortage

[jnyork]

The Casper, Wyoming Star-Tribune is our statewide daily newspaper. It is known to all that read it as the "Casper Red Star" or "Pravda West" for the constant liberal lunacy on the editorial pages. So, then, I was quite surprised this morning to see this levelheaded account of the ammo sitution on the front page of the the business section. Particularly interesting to me was the fact that the store is receiving the same ammount of ammo as they always have.










The line inside Sportsman’s Warehouse stretched nearly to the back of the large store on Thursday when the week’s supply of ammunition arrived in an 18-wheeler from Salt Lake City.

For the past five months this has been a Thursday ritual at the Casper store. People come as early as 11 a.m. to wait until the ammo has been unloaded and is ready for sale around 3 p.m.

Each customer can buy only three boxes of any particular type.

Ardell Breed’s husband usually makes the trip, but he had to work, so she checked the list from him and her son that she had on her phone. She arrived at 1:45 p.m. and was loading the $750 worth of purchases into her car an hour later.

‘I have more’

Employee Heather Strong shouted “I have more” above the noise of 10 clerks and at least 75 milling customers. Extra employees are assigned to the ammo rush every Thursday, and they say the customers are patient.

Christen Osmotherly describes the point of view of the employees feverishly trying to fill orders: “It’s a rush, hectic. It keeps you on your toes. People are nice about having to wait in line. They know we don’t want to sell everything to the people in the front of the line.”

General Manager Miles Bundy describes the Thursday scene as “mad, panic buying.”

He said that soon after the killings in Newtown, Conn., in December and the calls for gun regulation, people began “buying everything.”

Prices have not gone up at Sportsman’s Warehouse, a fact some of the buyers mentioned appreciatively. But Bundy thinks some of the customers buy to resell at a higher price.

The biggest sellers are the .22-caliber bulk ammunition and .223 ammo.

Why the rush?

Bill Jackson, who has been a regular Thursday customer for five months, said Casper is one of the best places for buying ammunition; he said it’s harder to find in Colorado and New Mexico.

“People buy them (the ammo boxes) partly because they’re afraid that even if no (gun) laws are passed, taxes may be raised so they can’t afford it,” Jackson said.

He noticed that “everybody wants the .22s; that’s the cheap kind of ammo that people like to use when they just go out plinking.”

Bundy said Sportsman’s Warehouse is receiving the same shipment it always has from a large warehouse in Salt Lake City that supplies a number of the chain’s stores. He added that people are buying powder, primer and items that they need to make bullets.

Customer Dave Kenke’s plan was to make his own ammo, but the store was out of powder.

The mood in the line for ammunition was cheerful for a city where people are almost never willing to wait in a line.

Three employees from one Casper business had slipped out of work to make their purchases, “tag-teaming” to help each other out with the three-box limit.

Another store visitor in town from Douglas just wanted to see all the fuss, but he left, unwilling to wait in line for two hours.

“It’s like hitting the lottery to get the .22 bullets,” Jackson said after waiting in line and finding what he wanted.

[AJMD429]

Good article for a 'Liberal' news-rag.

I liked this part though - "He added that people are buying powder, primer and items that they need to make bullets."

Never knew you could make them that way...

[wecsoger]

On the web, store advertised price for .22LR brick at $22. So I'm sure that's where the $100 bricks we're seeing at the gun shows are coming from.

My gut feeling, another two months and the ammo scare will be over.

That is, of course, barring another mass casualty event (that the anti-gunners are praying for), further gun-control legislation attempts or major stupidity from our current r̶e̶g̶i̶m̶e̶ administration.

Neither of the three possibilities above do I discount though.

[86er]

Interesting. I was able to get two 100-round plastic sleeves of WW 40gr high velocity 22LR at the local feed store for $9.29 per box. They only got 3 boxes with their total ammo shipment and I bought all 3. The price is up but not completely unreasonable like some places I have been hearing about.

[olyinaz]

Our Sportsman's Warehouse has a similar scene. People line up at 0500 every SAT morning in order to be in place for a numbers draw at 0700, then at 0900 when the store opens the line is out the door and across the parking lot. By noon the weekly load is all gone. It's insane and I refuse to join in, but that's what Obama and his jackass clowns have reduced us to - the Soviet Union. I served to fight that kind of ¢rap and now Obama has brought it to the U.S., courtesy of the same leftist idiots who brought it to Russia.

I did find 100rds of Aquilla high velocity .22 LR at one of my shops the other day, so I can go shooting this coming week and not feel like I'm chipping away at what I've got, but it's pretty silly around here. Certainly not my first choice for ammo though. We'll see how the Ruger Target likes it.

[FWiedner]

Took a drive to the western slopes in CO this past week.

Just for curiousity sake I stopped into several sporting goods and gun shops to see what was there.

Of maybe a half-dozen stops in N. TX, NM and CO, not a single shop had a stock of CCI-200.

The Sportsman's Warehouse in Grand Junction, CO said they were "expecting a truck."

I was only looking for a 1000-pack and would have bought them if they'd had them.

It's kinda tight out there.

[Nate Kiowa Jones]

The main thing I got from the articles is the stores are still getting the same amount of ammo they were getting before. That reinforces my belief that the supply side is still producing at normal levels. But the demand side has gone up because of all the politics.
Some are convinced there's some sort of Government conspiracy. I just don't see it. We dealt with the same sort of shortages before. All though it seem more sever I just think it is because more people now know that these laws can pass I.E. the 94 AWB.
The ammo makers know this is politically driven and will eventually subside so they aren't going to add more equipment.

[deafrn]

After being party to a conversation today at a local farm/home type store that does a volume business in common varieties of ammunition, I've finally heard enough to be convinced that the only remaining reason for shortages continuing is a combination of people who are speculating in ammunition and people who are amassing a "lifetime +" supply. In both categories, I have witnessed human behavior the last few months that I would never have thought possible given that I know the individuals involved, and suffice it to say that a certain percentage of people don't need even genuine hard times to reveal what horses' backsides they really are.

(Hardly a new discovery, but always discouraging to learn its extent.)

So put me down as - while agreeing that while there are still some political/legal factors exacerbating the supply of certain commodities - this has become a shortage driven by nominal "friends." I also believe that NKJ is correct in what he says about the manufacturers; those lads have the skinny and are demonstrating that they are not about to expand beyond what demand will remain once the speculators have enough increasingly-hard-to-move inventory left on their hands or the shooters discover they have stockpiled past the point of diminishing returns.

One of the few silver linings from this situation is that some acquaintances who didn't think that having at least 250 to 500 rounds at hand and ready to go at any time have "seen the light" and thus spared themselves any future lectures from me on that subject.

As opposed to ammunition, the firearms supply is healing nicely around here. My favorite LGS has a better supply of guns as of yesterday than I have seen there in a year, which is in line with most of the larger retailers in my region. Unless someone is hell-bent on a very specific brand/model or something too new to be in the pipeline, it appears to be out there at relatively reasonable rates.

d

[Modoc ED]

..........and thus spared themselves any future lectures from me on that subject.

d

What was that all about? You surpassed my attention span sometime in the second paragraph - I know, not too hard to do but still.............

[WyoShooter]

Our local Rocky Mountain Sporting Goods is selling the 50 rnd. box of American Eagle .22 LR for under $2.50 a box with a four box limit.
I am fortunate and don't have to stand in lines for ammo. I bought most of what I have last summer before the election and prepared for it. I told my shooting friends to buy at that time because it was not going to be available if the Bastard-in-Chief won a second term and started pushing more of his anti-gun agenda. Most of them didn't listen to me. Now some of them are mad because I won't sell them any of my ammo. I am hanging on to it.

[pshort]

WyoShooter; Same here, I warned folks I knew to stock up, only one guy listened. Now they want our stuff! I tell a few that if it's an emergency, I'd give them a box or two for free, but I'm not selling any!
Maybe they stocked up on food and we can do some trading!!!

Paul

[AJMD429]

In both categories, I have witnessed human behavior the last few months that I would never have thought possible given that I know the individuals involved, and suffice it to say that a certain percentage of people don't need even genuine hard times to reveal what horses' backsides they really are.

Wait until the item in question isn't ammunition or primers, but . . . is FOOD. . .

It has happened elsewhere, and in 'modern economies' like Argentina, not that long ago, so likely only a matter of time before it happens here.

[ollogger]

Im thinking if it ever gets close to normal again there will be a second wave
of buying, I havent bougt anything but 12 boxes of 40s&w,oh & 300 270 bullets for 60 bucks
Im not hurting for any kind of components or 22 ammo, but if the shelves ever get stocked
again you can bet ill be buying, & im thinking theres plenty here on Leverguns & eleswhere
that will be doing the same thing


ollogger