I do agree that "some" people are going too far with ammo stockup. Some of that may have been driven by the "get it when you see it as it is so hard to find". I know for myself and some of my friends have had times in the past months where we couldn't go to the range as we didn't have enough ammo. In other words the range session would have depleted what I had and left me without any. I didn't want to run dry whith it being difficult to re supply. But it seems to be getting a bit better recently. I have seen more ammo lately, but you still have to be pretty quick to get it, it will not sit long.
I service a few firearm stores in the NH,ME area (voice, data, surveillance). I spent two weeks working in one the past month. I would be in there before they opened and got to see daily, the rush that came in and went strait to the ammo shelves. The store stocks out a bit every morning. It would be mostly gone in 15 minutes for the hard to find at the moment stuff (22LR, 9MM, .223). So I have been able to restock in the past month due to ammo seems to be showing up a bit more in the past month or so.
I have some friends that won't shoot unless they have at least 2,000 rounds of whatever caliber they will be shooting. I don't feel I need this much by any means. I feel for myself that I do not want to go lower then 200 rounds in any pistol caliber or shotgun and a bit more for rifle, say 500. I do not think that is hoarding amounts by any means. I do have more then that right now, I just would not want to go below those amounts.
Another part of the lack of availability is surely due to all the new firearms the Gov has encouraged the sale of. By talking "Ban" they have been the best sales booster the firearms business has ever seen. There are so many new firearms and new owners out there that need ammo to feed their new hungry firearms. Even if some people were not hoarding, all the new weapons will/would have affected the supply as well. Large businesses such as ammo manufacturers run based on demand. They can not double/triple/etc production at the drop of a switch. That does not even account for the time it takes to go from materials (production) to the shelves. Or the fact that many manufacturers of anything firearm are hesitant to manufacture some things due to being worried about bans on said items. If that happens, then it can be a big hit to them and big enough to put some out of business.
Not like anything I said is new news. I guess I was just stating I feel hoarding is only part of the issue. People will stock up only to a certain point before they run out of room or money. And not all of the new firearm owners will get seriously into the hobby/life. So in the next months to a year, expect to see many used firearms for sale and a lot of ammo on shelves. Just like the demand caused a shortage, I think you will see a huge drop in demand cause an overage. At one of the shops I was working at last week, they had two pallets of 15-22's. All different models and good prices. There are plenty of them around at least!
