Crazy run on primers...but not so much on powder?

SLT223

SLT223

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All components are being bought in excess of actual use in these uncertain times, but it seems primers are leading the race in backorders and out of stock notifications. Why is that? Six or seven years ago it was primarily Pistol powder, not so much primers, that went MIA for about four years. None of this effects me because I stocked up in the last crunch and there after, but why primers this time around? Did everyone go over kill on powder after the powder shortage, neglect primers, then suddenly realize in April 2020 their powder is useless without primers?

For entertainment purposes check auction prices for primers if you have a second. Thank goodness I don't need them.
 
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Holy smokes! One guy had Rem 1 1/2's for a buy now price of $500. 😱 So $100. for a carton of 1000. I was at a shop today and picked up the same thing for 29 bux. 🤯
 
SKY HIGH

I just watched an auction for 5M CCI small pistol primers close for $645 (w/ship). Twenty-five bids. That's crazy!
H-F Hank
 
In March I bought a couple thousand small pistol primers--my lgs had a good supply then. $35/1K

Around May/June they were sold out so I put my name on their want list. I got a call yesterday that spp came in so I picked up 3K (I wanted 5K but that was all the Federal they had left, so I took it) at $40/1K. Looking behind the counter there were about 60-70K spp on hold. There were maybe 4-5K CCI spp on the shelf, its probably gone by now.

Small rifle primers are nowhere to be found but large pistol and rifle primers are plentiful for now. Lots of powder on the shelves.

This lgs doesn't stock much in the way of bullets but I can order that online--the mailman is cool and knows where to place my orders in my garage. He's new to the neighborhood and a nice young man, lucky for me!
 
I guess I'll have to slow down shooting 9mms and 38s and concentrate on 44s and 45s for a while. And people ask why I have so many different calibers! :cool:

Froggie
 
I found Federal which is my choice by far SPP and LPP at a LGS yesterday that normally has a great selection of reloading supplies. All Were magnum but that's what I use it every load I produce. Have plenty at home but went ahead and got 10k each just in case. His normal price is $34k and was glad to see he had not changed. Clerk did say next batch coming would be higher
 
I think we all learned a lesson during the powder shortage a few years ago! I know not to take for granted availability of ammo or components. So, when ammo and components are plentiful and cheap; buy what you can for times like these. Since I retired a year ago, I have more time for shooting/reloading. Since Covid-19, I haven't been to the range since March. I have all the range ammo loaded that I care to have on hand, until I can get back to the range to use some of it up. Presses have been idle for 4 months now. "Gougers" aren't getting any of my money.
 
Sadly, I'm quite cynical when it comes to these types of supply and demand questions. I remain convinced that (in normal, non-Covid, times) the manufacturers intentionally cut off the supply in order to get their prices (profit) up beyond the normal inflation factor. For example (and only ONE example) consider the fake shortage of .22 rimfire ammo a few years ago. They kept the supply 'off' for how many years? And then when a brick of .22's reached more than double the Walmart price (which was $14), the supply chain of 22's became instantaneously flooded. Primers will go from whatever they were before they shut them off to what I foresee at $40 - $50 per 1000. I have no more knowledge than the next guy, but let's figure on a 4 year dearth +/- Covid 19.
IMHO of course,
J.
 
s&wchad said:
Unless you have a business and are certified for hazmat, how do you ship primers?
Click to expand...

Easy. you do it with no regard for regulations. I bought an 8lbs container of tightgroup off gb from a dealer a few years back during the crunch. hammer price included shipping. it was not labelled properly and thus not shipped properly. that was the first time i had ever seen that.
 
After 2013 I would pick up primers and powder every time I went into a store . After a while stores were well stocked and these items went on sale ... I would pick up some every time I saw them .
I knew history was going to start repeating itself ... social media can spook the herd into panic so easily even Vladimir Putin laughed and said " Americans are so gullible " ... that's so sad that people can be fooled so easily but that's the way we are and it's not going to change .
Buy things when they are available , hoard them and wait for the next panic buying / shortage / price increase to happen again...and it will happen again...trust me !
Gary
 
Johnnu2 said:
Sadly, I'm quite cynical when it comes to these types of supply and demand questions. I remain convinced that (in normal, non-Covid, times) the manufacturers intentionally cut off the supply in order to get their prices (profit) up beyond the normal inflation factor. For example (and only ONE example) consider the fake shortage of .22 rimfire ammo a few years ago. They kept the supply 'off' for how many years? And then when a brick of .22's reached more than double the Walmart price (which was $14), the supply chain of 22's became instantaneously flooded. Primers will go from whatever they were before they shut them off to what I foresee at $40 - $50 per 1000. I have no more knowledge than the next guy, but let's figure on a 4 year dearth +/- Covid 19.
IMHO of course,
J.
Click to expand...

What you suggest here definitely would not work for me if I were running such business. If business is booming and my plant manager (or anyone with production decision authority) suggested shutting in to widen supply demand gap (thus letting my competition fill it), that would illustrate to me he/she is unknowledgeable about things like asset optimization, managing supply contracts, filling market contracts, managing cashflow, and would be fired instantly. I would want to replace him/her with some figuring out how to make even more at an even lower cost with existing assets. You simply dont shutter production when business is booming unless you literally wore out the plant. You also dont shutter production during demand destruction unless you absolutely have to. Shut down and start up is simply too expensive and logistically complicated to do because of short term blips in market conditions for large scale manufacturing. I think perceived shortages in times like these are better explained by a change in purchasing behavior vs a change in manufacturing behavior. Nor do I believe the situation is exacerbated by manufacturing withholding supply for reasons stated above.

Changing logistics in large scale manufacturing to meet demand increase is a LONG lead time item, in most cases, that involves changes from suppliers and to the plant line. That's capital expenditure and increased operating and variable costs. Its probably not something thats going to happen unless the manufacturer believes the surge is going to be around for a long enough time to pay back the expansion costs. Im pretty sure most folks in manufacturing see COVID as a short term surge / bust depending on what side of it you're on, as in 2020 /2021 time frame issue. For reloading components maybe that outlook changes this November, but I doubt it.

Now all that being said, my knowledge is more specific to refined products than ammo components. They may be far more flexible than I can imagine, but deliberately slowing down when the market is making a historical call on your product doesnt add up to me. I dont think it adds to profit. I think it would make very uncomfortable conversation about earnings during a board meeting. I think manufacturing and with holding sales for perceived unknown future value vs selling into the current strength would lead to the same uncomfortable conversation.
 
Back in the last round of no primers(2012-13) I id a gun show. I had a bit over a 1/4 million primers I took to the show. Primers other than mine were priced at 50-60 dollars. Powder was a bit short too. I sold all those primers in a couple hours at one thousand per buyer for 30 bucks a thousand. I still made a ton on them but the price gouging at the time by most sellers was horrible. But when 22s were short I saw idiots pay as much as 90 dollars a brick(500) for them at a couple of auctions. I got all the primers together the other day and I have over 150 thousand right now...And I just bought a couple thousand Rem 7 1/2s(20 dollars and a 1000LR) from a friend yesterday. He doesn't load small rifle I have way more LRs than I need
 
SLT223 said:
What you suggest here definitely would not work for me if I were running such business. If business is booming and my plant manager (or anyone with production decision authority) suggested shutting in to widen supply demand gap (thus letting my competition fill it), that would illustrate to me he/she is unknowledgeable about things like asset optimization, managing supply contracts, filling market contracts, managing cashflow, and would be fired instantly. I would want to replace him/her with some figuring out how to make even more at an even lower cost with existing assets. You simply dont shutter production when business is booming unless you literally wore out the plant. You also dont shutter production during demand destruction unless you absolutely have to. Shut down and start up is simply too expensive and logistically complicated to do because of short term blips in market conditions for large scale manufacturing. I think perceived shortages in times like these are better explained by a change in purchasing behavior vs a change in manufacturing behavior. Nor do I believe the situation is exacerbated by manufacturing withholding supply for reasons stated above.

Changing logistics in large scale manufacturing to meet demand increase is a LONG lead time item, in most cases, that involves changes from suppliers and to the plant line. That's capital expenditure and increased operating and variable costs. Its probably not something thats going to happen unless the manufacturer believes the surge is going to be around for a long enough time to pay back the expansion costs. Im pretty sure most folks in manufacturing see COVID as a short term surge / bust depending on what side of it you're on, as in 2020 /2021 time frame issue. For reloading components maybe that outlook changes this November, but I doubt it.

Now all that being said, my knowledge is more specific to refined products than ammo components. They may be far more flexible than I can imagine, but deliberately slowing down when the market is making a historical call on your product doesnt add up to me. I dont think it adds to profit. I think it would make very uncomfortable conversation about earnings during a board meeting. I think manufacturing and with holding sales for perceived unknown future value vs selling into the current strength would lead to the same uncomfortable conversation.
Click to expand...

Good post that makes a lot of sense to everyone but the conspiracy disciples.
 
Last July a lot of suppliers had big sales on primers and other reloading supplies. With the Winchester rebates, I picked up 10k primers at $26 dollars a brick,(after rebate, and sale price) I now wish I bought double that now, who knew ?
 
I bought 1000 SR win primers couple days ago. Added to my inventory. I probably have enough to last rest of my life, but son and brothers occaisonally need a few.
 
SLT223 says it very well IMHO.

Primers and .22 seem to get drained fastest and most severely in these situations. I read someplace recently it is because the manufacturing processes for these particular products (the primer part) are the most difficult to adjust volumes on. (Labor expertise and training, processes, etc.)

Capitalism is EXCEEDINGLY effective at creating efficient businesses. A major component of that product delivery system is optimizing around the average demand. As soon as that demand volume changes the whole system gets disrupted. What was pre-demand-surge an efficient delivery of product (cost vs price vs profit) has now gone totaly out of whack.

If I were in one of these shortage-susceptible businesses and knew the increased demand was long term I'd invest in increased capacity in a heartbeat. But since we've shown over and over that things will calm down after our individual storage locations will tip from the weight of everything we've accumulated and we stop buying, these manufacturers will be faced with the opposite situation: Full supply chains and shelves....and product not moving.

I've been in businesses where demand has temporarily exceeded product supply. It is an extremely unpleasant situation as a supplier - distributors/customers calling incessantly asking for special favors, etc. While I don't know for sure, I'm pretty sure these vendors would MUCH rather have business be now as it usually is.....as would we. Certainly a good chunk of the current drought can be attributed to new gun purchasers needing ammo for their new guns. But certainly existing gun owners are contributing to the ammo drought. And there CERTAINLY aren't enough new reloaders to have that be the cause of primers being impossible to find.
 
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I have been through these politically driven shortages since the Clinton Administration, and the so-called Assault Weapon Ban in the early 90s.

Primers have always disappeared first. Historically, it has been SPP evaporating, then the rest.

Now that the MSR is such a popular platform, and the vast majority of them shoot .223/5.56, it appears that Small Rifle primers have hit critical mass, and they have gone missing too.

I don't expect supply to smooth out until after November of this year. That is of course, depending upon the outcome of the election.

Primer supply may very well become moot.
 
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