What do you contribute these shortages to?

1. Hoarding?
2. Manufacturer's Covid problems, slowing production?
3. Manufacturers selling components to ammo companies, instead of to "us"?
4. Democrats loving these high prices and hoping to TAX us out of buying our shooting products?
5. Other ??? Import crap?

Hoarding and factories shutdown for the corona crap causing a gap in the supply chain.

1 and 5. I am sure there is some hoarding going on, but, IMO, that's not the main reason. There are a ton of new gun owners that have purchased guns during the pandemic/antifa riots. Those people now need to buy ammo to feed their new purchase. So many new buyers are now causing a drain on the ammo supplies. As soon as people start seeing the dwindling ammo stocks, they figure that they better go get theirs before it is all gone. Next thing you know, there is a mad rush to get whatever is left. People probably buy whatever is on the shelf whether they need it or not figuring that they can barter with it to get what they need.

Nothing like waiting until the last minute to hoard and pay full retail price (or more)!

Yes, the answer is yes.

I think unclebubba nailed it. I was in an Atwood’s yesterday and they had 3 boxes of 6mm CM, 4 boxes of 270, and 2 boxes of 7-08. No powder or primers. I was sniffing around for some Varget, knowing full well they wouldn’t have any.

They had plenty of rifles and handguns.

Just to say it, I was not motivated to buy the ammo they had left.

I spoke to one of my suppliers, who is one of the largest OEM suppliers in the nation. Several large manufactures have turned their component production into making ammo for their company, which heavily decreases the available products released on the retail and OEM side for components. Pair that with reduced mfg capacity due to Covid and they are producing less. Then add on the unprecedented demand, and you have a shortage. I've had my business since 2007, and I've worked through Sandy Hook, Obama, and many other high demand times. This time period is the highest demand ever, times about 10. I have have shut my website down again from taking new orders for the 4th time. I keep it open for orders for a few days, and then get slammed again. It's a cycle for me right now. I've never seen it like this.

I found Varget yesterday but it was $38.50. A bit high but not some of the craziness I’ve saw.

we should have bought more primers when we had the chance

who knew ??

A triple whammy is what happened.

Fyi...Scheels in The Colony has 9mm and .45 in stock. Two box limit for each caliber.

I can find brass, I can find bullets, I can find powder. None of which is any good if ya don't have the matches to fire the puppy up. I only have 400 primers left. So, from here on out it is mainly 22LR I will be shootin. This primer shortage is a killer! Make it thru this and I guarantee ya I will never be less than 10,000 at any given time.

Chad, you pretty much nailed the basics here. Like Chad I've been in this business for a LONG time (since 1974 when I had a retail store) and I've never seen anything even close to this demand for ANY product that has ANYTHING to do with self-defense/tactical. It's a PERFECT STORM created by:

China virus pandemic
Releasing violent prisoners
Protests
Riots
Dramatic increase in overall crime
Uncertainty of the presidential election
The worst threat ever for our constitutional republic by the violent left

Trust me people are SCARED and this time it's different, it's not just gun people, it's the masses.

Top that with:

Delays in delivery of raw material for mfg
Employees not coming to work due to illness or fear
The fact that "in the scheme of things" as my wife always says, the firearms industry is relatively small with limited resources

At Wilson Combat we've almost doubled our mfg capacity since the first of the year and are doing a record amount of product delivery, but every week we get further behind due to the new orders continuing to flow in. 2020 is already the best sales year in the 41 year history of the company and we still have over 3 months to go! Every colleague in the industry I talk to is in a similar situation. Trust me, everyone in the industry is working as hard as they can in an attempt to meet this unprecedented demand.

No one I've talked to in the industry expects this to slow down before Q3 2021 at the absolute earliest.

"Hoarding" No! "Preparing" Yes!

Only those who have waited too late to gather the firearms, ammunition, and other supplies they need consider it hoarding. Those that planned ahead just consider it as proper preparation.

There is only one reason for shortages; Demand is greater than production.

Mr. Wilson gave a good account of the causes that is driving the demand, The sad part is the average guy can do nothing to counteract the causes, so he is preparing in the only way he can.

Totally agree. We had 8 years of shortages due to Obama. You had 3 years of cheap and plentiful under Trump. There is no excuse not to be prepared going in to an election year.

Yes, I've got more than I need from Obama times, but if I find some I'll buy it, I see possibility dark times coming for shooters.

Me too, Buzz. Picked 8 lbs of TAC from Powder Valley recently since it was $160. I couldn't pass it up at that price and with the current shortage. TAC burns so clean and it's great for 5.56, 308 and 338 Federal.

This was the handgun and shotgun ammo aisles at Academy in Corpus Christi today. Most of their other shelves in the fishing and hunting area look the same. The Academy in Portland wasn't much better for ammo but it was better overall for other stuff. I was able to find H4350 in stock at a local gun shop here.

So what did you pick up?

I just picked up a few dust bunnies at Academy. They were Boone & Crockett dust bunnies though!

Gunshow or just regular resellers hit Academy in Denton hard every morning that the truck shows up. The line is 50 deep by 9am. One guy was 7th in line at 4:30am. They're pretty dedicated. Wild.

Factory Ammo at gun shows goes 2x-4x what it was bought for at the store the day before. that's why the lines are so long every morning. I know of a guy, never met him, who drives to 40-50 stores during the week buying up what ammo he can find, then takes it to the gun shows on the weekend and triples his money. Back at the first of September he had $1300 worth of factory ammo at the Dallas Gun show to sell, another vendor came up to him and offered him $2300 for what he had and that still left him room for a good profit.