Recession?

[dewage83]

How many guys have the extra income to shoot? Unless you're past the point of raising kids, how are you going to afford a gun, the ammo, and gas to go drive to shoot?

....how about over the age of living in Grandpa's basement, But not in your our home yet type? same thing there. Ammo prices have played a HUGE part in which guns I bought. My average range trip cost ABOUT 50, on a good cost/bad range time type day. Not crazy high but my gas for my car, my food costs, my.... you get it.
Yes the economy is playing a part, but as was said I believe it also is affected by the generation of shooters. 30 years ago there wasnt a video game (In almost every teens house) that had a real model of a firearm that you could use as a civilian. When the generation of shooters change so does the demand. Economics played a big part IMO. lots of left over guns with no one buying them, cost goes down.

 

[MCgunner]

How many guys have the extra income to shoot? Unless you're past the point of raising kids, how are you going to afford a gun, the ammo, and gas to go drive to shoot?

My kid is raised, but not yet out of the house. :banghead: However, that wouldn't stop me. I've been an outdoorsman all my life. I belong to bay gun club, nice range, 30 bucks a year and 4 miles from my house. I have land to shoot on that I hunt about 20 miles from my house. AND, I reload, life long handloader. I get lead cheap at the range out of the back stop, it's called FREE. All I pay for is primers and powder. I shoot a lot of .22. For rifles, I do use jacketed bullets, but it still beats store bought, plus I can roll much, much better ammo for my guns. 7.62x39 is still quite affordable store bought, too, if you shoot Wolf. SKSs don't care about the steel case.

There are many ways to skin the cat for the dedicated shooter. Oh, GAS? I have 3 street legal motorcycles and a 40 mpg Toyota Echo in addition to the gas guzzlin' Chevy van.

Range trip cost? Let's see, about 100 rounds of centerfire pistol/revolver ammo per trip at about 5 bucks, maybe, allowing for the fact that primers and powder have gone up. At most, a 12 dollar box of .22 Lightening. Maybe a few 5 dollar boxes of Wolf and a box of .308 or 7 mag or .257 Roberts, maybe, at about 4 bucks on the high side.

So, total that out to 31 bucks, right? I normally don't shoot THAT much, but sometimes. That would be an expensive trip. Oh, hell, toss in 50 cents for gas to get out to the range and back. Then, maybe subtract 5 bucks for the lead I'd dig out of the backstop. Hmm, then there's the normal amount of brass I scrounge off the ground.....

I've often wished I'd bought out of town so I could build a range in the back of the house. But, listening to you guys, hell, I feel pretty well off. LOL! Besides, I'd still belong to the range. Lots of good folks in the club, been a member for 25 years nears about. It's only 30 bucks a year. I get a lot more than that out of it in lead and brass! And, we have a fun shoot every month which keeps me out of trouble if I got nothing else to do.

 

[Triple S]

On a related subject, I am curious if a company like Midway's reloading supplies are breaking sales records. As we all know, ammo is EXPENSIVE now. I really wonder if the reloading sales have increased a bit?

 

[MCgunner]

I've talked to a lot of folks that are considering reloading, both on the net and face to face. Kinda like the fact that I see a LOT of scooters and motorcycles on the road now, MUCH more popular than 20 years ago, really boomin' in the last year.