.22 ammo long gone!

[Blackhorse]

Looking for .22 LR ammo? Good luck! There appears to be a national shortage or something...since last year! I went to buy some today, not having had a .22 firearm for a long time and now waiting vfor one to arrive after a recent purchase and the guy I talked to shook his head and looked at me like I wuz nuts. He said they weren't able to get any shipments at all. So where's it all going? Afghanistan? I finally found the brand and style I wanted online, and that was five pages into a google search.

It's weird. What's next? Milk?

 

[Carlos]

Go to your local Walmart and hang out at the firearms counter around 6AM in the morning. Make it clear that you want to be the first in line for the days sales of .22 ammo and you don't give a damn what employee is friends with who, you are first in line and get the choice. When they bring it out at 7-7:30am, buy your .22 ammo.

Repeat as necessary daily. You may have to get earlier each day to be first in line. You also have to throw a fit to the store manager when the employees try to by-pass you and take care of their hoarding friends.

 

[Carlos]

It's all kinds of gun related stuff. Reloading powder as an example. There are guys buying up skids of the stuff from sales reps and reselling on Gun Broker at double normal pricing. They are storing it in their garages and shipping it without declaring it to be hazardous. So the retailers are almost always out. But you can get anything if you want to pay for it. The law is looking the other way for some reason. It's a joke!

 

[Blackhorse]

I don't have the option of doing mornings at Wally World...and as I mentioned I did find it art one lone etailers...picked up 10 boxes for the standard price.

Thing is...I needed one branding...the CCI Mini Mag, which is specified by Sig as the required feeding for the Mosquito. So at least I'll feed it properly as a new born, til things settle in and I decide if I want to polish the feed ramp, which I'll likely do...and champher the top of the chamber, which I'll maybe do as well. This Sig is notorious for glitchy feeding issues, but running the right ammo and having a slippery ride for the soft nosed ol' .22 cures it. Or so I read.

But I'm good. For now.

 

[puros_bran]

It's out there. Our Cabela's get 25,000 rnds PER WEEK.

Carlos is only wrong about one thing. It's not the hoarders buying it up anymore. It's the flippers. Buy a brick for $10-12, resell it for $40-50.
I'm all about capitalism but it's ridiculous. Being first in line or having a buddy in receiving shouldn't allow one to destroy the entirety of the market.

 

[mark]

Two years ago the price of a brick jumped from $9 to $20 overnight and it went scarce and became priced out of sight since. The 500 round brick often was a 400 round brick and two cents per round was now six. Dealers were blaming the growing throngs of "preppers" for the drought and government conspiracies abounded. If they couldn't ban firearms they would control ammo. (the predicted currency once the system breaks down)

 

[Blackhorse]

A 1600 ammo can of premium CCI now goes for about a hundred bucks, or so.

I fail to be persuaded by proclamations of conspiracy, tales of gougers reselling online to support their aging parents, etc. I only have to think of pipe tobacco shortages to make my eyes roll.

To be OOS across all manufacturers, all brandings, in all stores, in every region of the country...that's what's weird. But this is America! If there's a market not being met, someone will step in. 

It does make one stop and think however...with the cost of the two products growing ever closer...is the 9 mm the new .22 LR?

 

[Puff Daddy]

I got rid of my 6.5 X .55 Mauser some time back because the price of ammo got stupid. Went from around $8 for a box of 20 to over $25 in a little over a year. No longer need the gun at those prices.

Same reason I stopped shooting the refuges during waterfowl season. No lead, steel shot or bismuth only, 4 times the price for shells. No thanks.

 

[Blackhorse]

If it's one of those things that someone needs so much they'll buy it at any price...they call it dope.

 

[puros_bran]

Same reason I stopped shooting the refugees during waterfowl season. No lead, steel shot or bismuth only, 4 times the price for shells. No thanks.

Wiat.. What?? You've quit shooting refugees? But that's what we pay you for.



BlackHorse. The internet has taken away any notion of 'local market' Both for purchasing and selling. After a quick Google to locate what I want I can call/email/online shopping cart out of your hometown and sell it to a guy in Puff Daddy's hometown and never get within 2,000 miles of the actual product.

 

[Richard Burley]

There must be a lot of shootin' goin' on. If not, I predict a surfeit of ammo of all types--unless the anti-gun nuts gain ascendency, and there's a further wave of buying frenzy. If I were a manufacturer of ammo, I would be hesitant to tool up for increased production at this juncture. The anti-gun "movement" has failure written all over it, at least here in the U.S. Molon labe, and all that.

 

[Blackhorse]

PB - yes dear, I know. My reference was directed toward a manufacturer/wholesaler/point of sale situation. It's like a tree diagram. Where along that branching system is the flow stopped? In other words, the guys hijacking the product have to be higher up the chain to create a national shortage...and for ALL brands? And businesses that even allow online ammo purchases often have limits...like the one tin of FVF etailers. And the whole distribution network is set up by contract systems that would preclude leaks of the magnitude we're looking at here (100%). I still don't buy the conspiracy or gouger theories. 

You, of course, are more than welcome to believe whatever *#@%, ¥×∆π<img class="emojione" alt="" title=":registered:" title=":registered:" src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/emojione/assets/png/00ae.png?v=2.2.7"/> or unworkable thing is afoot that you please. I certainly respect your rights in that regard. 
 :lol!:

 

[DoverPipes]

Funny, I'm up to my eyeballs in .40 , .223, 12 Gauge........... 

 

[Blackhorse]

Yeah...plenty of that around here too. It's just the .22 LR that's vanished.

 

[puros_bran]

All brands everywhere because it's profitable. It's not just one guy.
It's private parties, retailers themselves, and overnight boom business etailers.    Remember several years back when Dunhill went off the market for awhile?  It was literally hours, not days or weeks, before it was sold out everywhere.  

Like I said Cabelas in Louisville gets 25,000 rounds of 22lr per week.. That the equivalent of 50 bricks.  And that's just one store.  It's not a 'supply problem' at the moment, it's being produced.  What I do fear is when the bubble burst and all these shops have standing orders for as much 22lr as possible with shelves over flowing with the stuff... It's going to effect the retailers, the distribution warehouses, the manufacturers...


As to why it exists? It's much simpler than it appears. The demand a few years back during the prime of "Obama is going to take our guns/cause a doomsday scenario"  combined with massive federal orders that caused companies to produce the more profitable large caliber rounds with the limited components available caused a momentary hick up.  People panicked and wiped out remaining supplies.  The vultures set in.    It's not rocket science dear.

And like you I do not really care why you do or do not believe it exist. You are allowed to be wrong if you chose.

 

[Richard Burley]

The demand a few years back during the prime of "Obama is going to take our guns/cause a doomsday scenario"  combined with massive federal orders...

This was awesome, dude. I remember going to the Rochester NY gun show at that time. You couldn't get into the huge parking lot. Watching from a highway overpass on a Sunday you could see cars for about two miles around circling the lot waiting for someone to either pull out or pick up passengers. I cancelled my plans and got the hell out before the site erupted into gun play. You know how gun folks are.