Ah, the Beforetimes.

It’s hard to believe that we’re still living in a world where Brownells has just 39 ammo products in stock (many of which are packages where some ammo is sold with another product such as an optic or a half dozen magazines) out of 3,068 products in their ammunition category. That’s 0.13 percent of the ammo products they carry that are actually in stock.

Granny has a point.

 

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60 COMMENTS

    • When you have a wholesale account, get free shipping, buy it on sale, and then use one of their online coupons. I can’t tell you how much S&B 6.5cm I bought from them that way. By doing what I described it got a case of 500 down to around $300 at my front door. Prior to covid hitting early last year ammo was overstocked and cheap everywhere you looked.

    • When it is one of the few places that would ship to your house in California if you have an FFL 03 that’s why.

  2. Another funny one👍.

    Heard on news tv that fireworks were going to be in short supply this Independence Day.

    • I didn’t think Independence day was celebrated any more. The America of our fathers no longer exists.

      This year, I guess I will celebrate it looking to a possible future restoration. (Kinda like the Israelites continued to celebrate Passover while exiled to Babylon)

  3. The thought of paying fiddy sents for a round of 9mm just rubs me the wrong way. I did find some really nice .45 ACP brass in Colorado at a good price….but they won’t ship to California. I guess they don’t know that the ammo law applies only to loaded ammo, not components….45 Colt brass cannot be found. Fortunately I can reload what I have…. But if this drought hits us any harder (it is supposed to get near 110 next week so the red flag warnings will be up), all the outdoor ranges will be shut down because of the fire danger…. Should I buy a bow instead?…another caption. “Oh Grandma, you know that stuff hasn’t been around for fifty years or more!”

    • “The thought of paying fiddy sents for a round of 9mm just rubs me the wrong way.”

      Things are *slightly* improving.

      My local Bass Pro is showing 19 varieties of 9mm as being ‘in stock’, so the next day or so I think I’ll mosey 0n over at 5 AM to see what exists when the place opens…

        • I weigh less than you, boy.

          Tell me – Are you yet getting tired of TTAG management erasing your pathetic mewlings? 😉

    • Since shipping the brass is legal and you’re on the interwebz you could get someone in Colorado to assist you in procuring your .45ACP brass and then forwarding it to you.

      Since I don’t know who the seller is I cannot guarantee anything without looking into it but, being in Colorado, I’d be happy to help at no charge. Hell, depending on the seller’s location I might be able to save you a bit on shipping assuming they still have stock and all those logistical issues that go with any procurement.

      Let me know.

  5. 7.62×39 seems like it’s getting back to where it was.

    But I doubt we’re going to see .22, 9mm, .45, 5.56 get back to normal for another year, if ever. It took what, 3 years for .22 to get back to normal after 2013, and this panic was magnitudes worse then that one.

    Diversify your ammo portfolio. Get something that can shoot the cheap Russian shit if you want to keep shooting.

    • I recall reading a statement from one of the ammo mfr CEOs that he expects prices to remain high for at least another two years. If (and it’s a big if) Trump or a solid pro-Constitution conservative is votes as POTUS in 2024, we might see an eventual slump again, similar to 2017. But even so, that’s 3-1/2 yrs away.

      And if the balloon goes up before then, all bets are off.

      • “I recall reading a statement from one of the ammo mfr CEOs that he expects prices to remain high for at least another two years.”

        Mid-terms will tell the tale, and as of right now, it looks the Leftists are bracing for some very bad news in that election.

        Losing control of the House (*very* likely at this point) neuters them cold. We have a solid shot at the Senate, and that means we will control judicial appointments Yes-No.

        Going after Trump legally will cost them dearly if they elect to proceed. Even if Trump himself is tied up, I bet one of his kids will be happy to step up.

        Then they have the serious problem of running against a Trump message coming from a younger, nicer version of Trump… 😉

        • As much as our President-In-Exile deserves his second term, I think we’d be better served if he ran for the new House seat in Florida.

          Nothing would be more ice cream in the face for Nancy than having to yield the Speaker’s chair to Trump.

        • Geoff “Mid-terms will tell the tale…it looks the Leftists are bracing for some very bad news in that election.”

          Keep ignoring the elephant in the room… “”It’s not who votes that counts, it’s who counts the votes” The left has built a very fine cheating apparatus that is nicely defended by their gaggle of women SOS’s.

          And Dred, that’s some sweet ice cream, even if Nancy would likely impale herself with the gavel first.

        • ”It’s not who votes that counts, it’s who counts the votes”

          The states with the worst abusers have had their wings clipped somewhat in that department.

          It won’t be the same the next time around. Planning is taking place on dealing with the fraud of last time…

    • 7.62*39 is down to 33¢ a round bulk (cheapest I found on ammoseek right now). The price is dropping, as I paid 38¢ a round for it a month or two ago. It was up to about 50¢ at one point.

      Back in February 2020, I bought some for 16.9¢ a round (and .223 same price, same time). I bought more 7.62*39 last summer for 26¢.

      5.56/.223 is also gradually dropping, but currently remains high above 7.62*39.

      7.62*39 is by far the best deal going in ammo right now. Fortunately, I have something to shoot 7.62*39. Unfortunately, I have more guns that shoot .223, and less .223 than 7.62*39.

  6. Prices from the before time.

    From old ammo ‘favorites’

    All steel – prices per 1k

    30-06 – 300
    308 – 280
    7.62×39 – 180
    5.45×39 – 180
    .223 – 180

  8. Those of you who are old enough to know better should have been stocked up. 1 less latte a day and no fast food would have bought at least 1k rounds a month. It’s always been a matter of preparation and priorities. Now ammo is 3-4 times what it was just 2 years ago when you can find it and everyone is screaming about it. Its not like it hasn’t happened before, It always comes down to the same thing. The Principle of the 7 P’s. Prior Proper Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance. Hopefully people will learn this time. Especially those who haven’t had to deal with this Shit before.

    • But I have to eat fast food and smoke multiple times per day. I don’t have much time so I’ll often smoke while eating at the same time. I also need a caffeinated beverage every 4 hours. If I don’t I start to get headaches and the shakes. In the middle of the night I’ll have to wake up to shit then I smoke and drink a little coffee and eat something greasy so I can go back to sleep. The only meal that isn’t fast food for me is dinner.

      • “I don’t have much time so I’ll often smoke while eating at the same time.”

        Cool, the sooner you ‘shuffle off this mortal coil’ the happier I’ll (and a healthy percentage of the TTAG regulars) will be.

        I kinda miss ‘Vlad’ anyways… 😉

      • Fake Miner, that was rather weak.

        You need to step up your game in order to keep us all entertained, dance troll, dance!

    • Just because you are stocked today doesn’t mean you will remain stocked. I’ve got just enough of most things, but I am down to around 300 rounds of 9 mm and a few boxes of hollow points. I also want to get some high end target .22LR (I have a few thousand plinkers) but it is too depressing to go into a store and look at the empty shelves.

  9. And I recall when tetra ehtyl lead gasoline was 27.9 cents a gallon, a pack of Winston cigs went up from 28 cents to 32 cents a pack. Now that price won’t even pay the TAX on a pack of cigs.
    I must be as old as GrandMa there………

    • Bought premium (leaded) gas for 21.9 in 1972. It was a gas price war. Remember those?

      • I saw it in the single digits in Missouri around that time during a gas war. also remember cigs for a quarter a pack.

  10. 6.50 for a box of fiddy. What’s that work out to per round? 7-8 cent a round? 9mm.

    .22 lr for about 40 cent a fiddy box. Shorts were a quarter for fiddy.

    • Early 70s, I remember the corner store had 50-round boxes of .22lr for a quarter…

      • Oddly enough back then 9mm, at least in my area, was the most expensive of the common handgun rounds except for the big magnums. I think it was because 9mm wasn’t yet our military round and the cops had yet to fall in love with it.

        With the exceptions of a few S&W pistols most of the 9mm’s I saw in the late 60’s early 70’s were ww2 surplus.

      • Spent many an allowance which had to be worked for buying 25 cent boxes of 22 ammo at the local general store. Didn’t have to have an adult with me either.

    • Need to practice your maths. 50 rounds for $5 would be .10/round, 6.50 works out to .13.

  11. It’s going to be interesting to see if the less common calibers like 32 ACP and 9×18 return to normal-ish more quickly than standbys (9/40/45, etc.). Materials costs and supply chain issues are going to be there for any and all calibers, of course. But surely demand will drop for those calibers more quickly once panic buying (and reseller opportunities to capitalize on that panic) begins to wane.

    Just a thought.

    • You might be right. My local big box store has had .300 BO, 6.8 Western, and 6.5 Grendel on the shelves for weeks. Everything else pretty much disappears the same day, and that’s with a 3 box/customer limit.

  12. Shhhhh little Timmy, dont talk to grandma about gunms and bullets, they’ll think we might have some. You remember what happened to grandpa when the ATF took him away.

  14. Judging by the comments here, and my own experience, Com-bloc (android) calibers have weathered this storm better than most. 7.62×39 could/can be found and the prices while high did not balloon as much as. I have seen 5.45 in a brick and mortar store. 9×18 never disappeared. 7.62×25 was still around as well. Meanwhile NATO (apple) ammo . . .

    There is something to be said for having common calibers as well as some that are not so common.

  15. Remember when Academy sold CCI Blazer Aluminum 9mm FMJ for $70 a case?

    Pepperidge Farm Remembers.

    • Yep. Even thoughI I reload, when Blazer first came out I started buying it for outdoor practice and plinking. Always hated gathering brass out of the dirt.
      When my Grandfather passed a few years back, I ended up with the majority of his guns and ammo. A First Year Production High Standard Model B was the cherry on top, but all the ammo came my way. A couple of .22LR boxes date to the early 50’s (a Western and a Peters), but he had a whole bunch of Federal old red box, that he had purchased at Gibsons Discout Store with a price tag of $0.36/box. I”m guessing sometime in the 60’s he bought them.
      Amazingly, I’ve used most of the old stuff, and had only a handful of failures to ignite. Of those, most fired when I ran them through my cheap Heritage 22 (lined them up so the pin strikes a different spot on the rim). So out of the 500 or so rounds of nearly 60 year old Federal, only a dozen wouldn’t 2nd strike. I was impressed that I only had that few FTFs. Now the Western and Peters boxes I left as is. I might run into a collector that would want them.

      In the 45+ years I’ve been of age to buy and own guns, I’ve never seen an Ammo Shortage this bad. I go round the LGSs and they all have some guns, but zilch for ammo. Component wise, Primers are the biggest issue locally. None of the 6 stores have received any primers since July of 2020.

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