I think as supply eventually balances out demand we will see a decrease in the costs of components and factory ammo. It’ll never go back to pre-shortage levels but it will decrease. Most of the shortage is from the diminished supply chain and not from a manufacturing slowdown.

When I spoke to Morris at Rock Mountain he said that Powder was their issue. They cannot get it from anywhere, even overseas. He said that some of their larger Texas ranch and game preserve customers were dipping into their hoards and sending them powder so that they could load shells to sell them.

So, the above for the VGC goes right in line with this scenario.

A sad state of affairs with no apparent end in sight Brian. The RST rep told me the same thing at Hausmann's in June, powder was their issue, no problem getting primers because they were getting primed hulls directly from Cheddite.

It seems like we are in a cycle of going through these shortages every few years. It is inconvenient for us, but I worry most about the small suppliers like RST

If the powder manufacturer is working at capacity and supply chain is the problem then there must be a stuffed warehouse waiting on a truck to a distributer.
If so must Mr. Baker wait on the distributer or can he send his truck to the makers warehouse? The whole situation is baffling if all involved are telling the truth then a hell of a lot of product is in limbo and that means a lot of money from sales not made. This unrealized income has to be hurting all involved and it seems to have spread beyond the shooting sports to most of the economy.
I have no answer just a lot of questions as to why these products, if made can not be forwarded to the end user. Ammo makers want to sell the product to make a profit and i would think if i were in that situation i would find a way.

I didn't understand Mike's comment either. I would assume trucking/transport is a big issue, as are warehouse workers. Although I can't stand Dicks Sporting Goods, they were born here in Binghamton, NY and they built a bajillion square foot distribution center here and can't move product out of here for lack of warehouse workers, forklift drivers and truckers. Likewise they can't bring all the product in to distribute. There are more recreational shooters than golfers, and we added 9 million NEW gun owners last year. Were you to add 9 million more golfers (God help us..) they would have to build 10,000 more golf courses, so there are some big supply/manufacturing issues too. This data was from another thread on here from the NSSA, somewhere, can't find it.

I can understand primers going to the ammo factories and being prioritized before the reloading market. What puzzles me are Hodgdon and Alliant. They claim to only service reloading. Lead shot and plastic wads are plentiful why not powder. The only thing i can think of is the powder feed stocks are the supply problem, maybe nitrocellulose comes from China like about everything else.

Craig, check the MSDS for a few favorite powders and you’ll find they have small quantities of anti-sour stabilizers, burn deterrents, non-clump coatings and other ingredients, and many of those additives are far more “exotic” than NC or NG. Disruption in supply of any of those ingredients will stall production of that powder.

It is now 7 months later and this remains the latest news from Hodgdon on the powder shortage. A few things stuck out for me. They mention all the new gun owners being part of the extraordinary demand for powder then they go on to say that selling powder to ammo manufacturers is just a small part of their business. Which is it? Did all those new gun owners start reloading as well?

They go on to say that normal demand for powder would not be enough to support an expansion of their production facilities. How long and how much longer will there a severe shortage? With all the new guns and shooters is the old normal demand still a viable measure?

They say they shipped a record amount in 2020 and plan to ship even more in 2021. If so why does it hardly ever show up on shelves, why are decent size gun stores with empty shelves saying they have long standing and huge back orders and having back orders cancelled?

This is a link from the home page of Hodgdon Powder that I am referencing. "Where is the Powder"

https://hodgdon.com/wp-content/uploa...ate-ver6-1.pdf

https://hodgdon.com/

Today I paid $13 for a dozen wings (on wing night). Why is the chicken becoming an endangered species? Perhaps I should stop hoarding reloading components and start reading Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman.

-Victor