Even after the failed passage of “expanded background checks” in the U.S. senate people are still buying guns and ammo by massive numbers, with Sturm, Ruger reporting sales of 500,000 each in one quarter and a backorder list of over 2 million according to a recent report at zerohedge.
And ammo for many calibers is still unavailable in most areas of the U.S. for the most popular and used calibers.
It’s gotten so bad that retailers have started rationing ammo, selling only one or two boxes to each customer, when supplies are available. I know that the shelves at my local Wal-Mart have been empty for months, and the clerk told me that there are people who come into the store everyday, to by any .22, 9mm, .40SW, .38, .357, .223 and 7.62X39 ammo before it is even put on the shelf.
From the Daily Caller:
“The current political climate has caused extremely high demand on all shooting industry products, including ours,”according to Hornady. “Empty retail shelves, long backorders, and exaggerated price increases on online auction sites – all fueled by rumors and conjecture – have amplified concerns about the availability of ammunition and firearms-related items.”
I have a habit of going by the ammo case every time that I go into the Wal-Mart, just to check on what is / isn’t available and they recently, had two AR-15?s on the shelf, I almost fell over! I had not seen an AR for sale anywhere in months, and then bam there it was behind the glass…
Well even though I didn’t really need it, or could afford it, I decided to buy one of them, so I rushed to the bank to get the money needed and then back to sporting goods to buy my newly found treasure. I wasn’t gone over 30 minutes, but by the time I made it back, both rifles had already been sold!
I wonder how many AR-15 rifles have been sold during the past year? I searched but could not find a reliable source, for the actual numbers… Anyone…?
According to ABC News reporting on the total number of sales in 2012:
Record gun sales were recorded in December 2012 with over 2.7 million background checks being conducted through the FBI’s National Instant Check System (NICS), the agency said today. For 2012, more background checks were conducted than any year since 1998.
In December, 2,783,765 total background checks were carried out to purchase firearms, surpassing the previous record from November 2012 when 2,006,919 checks were performed.
For the year, 19,592,303 background checks carried out for firearm purchases – a 19 percent rise from 2011.
Each check doesn’t represent a single gun, just a single background check transaction.
Go back and read that again… yep, you read it correctly the first time, but it never hurts to take a second look to be sure – almost 20 million guns sold in 2012 alone. Folks that’s a lot of iron that equals a lot of firepower in the hands of the U.S. population… A rifle behind every blade of grass…
And let’s not forget the magazines (and no they aren’t “high-capacity” they are standard capacity magazines), my local hunting and fishing supplies store used to have stacks of Magpul Pmags available for $19.99 each not they have none, and it’s been that way for months. They did have a couple of used generic AR-15 magazines a couple of days ago priced at $45.99 each.
According to The Blaze:
Brownells, the largest gun parts supplier in the world, is claiming that it has had an “unprecedented” demand for AR-15 ammunition magazines of late. In fact, the demand is allegedly so great that the company allegedly sold 3.5 years worth of magazines in just three days during December of 2012.
And with the lack of inventory on the shelves, magazine sales are still going strong and I doubt it will slow in the near future…
But the question is – why are Americans still buying massive amounts or ammo, firearms and magazines, despite the fact of having already bought huge numbers of each over the past few months? Before the easiest answer and most logical answer would have been a “fear of more gun laws and or bans” but even now with the failure of expanded background checks in the senate and any “assault rifle” restrictions or bans and magazine capacity limits DOA for the time being, Americans are still buying and stockpiling…
The only logical answer is that folks are seeing the writing on the wall and know that the poop is about to hit the fan (whether it be gun bans by executive order, U.N. treaty of a wide reaching disaster or complete collapse of the system)…
I just hope that they’re also stockpiling food, grain mills, non-hybrid garden seed, water filters, and other survival gear and aren’t just planning to use their new firepower to take what they want from others that have prepared with a well-rounded survival plan (YOU).
