Is there not enough demand in Canada to...

[Ganderite]

In the 60's CIL decided to start exporting ammo to the USA. I was in their R&D department at the time. We were making over one million rounds of ammo a day at the time. I asked why we were trying to expand to the USA.

I was told that Americans buy a lot more ammo than Canadians. A Canadian, at that time, would buy one or two boxes of 22 ammo. An Amercian would buy one or two bricks.

The line I recall clearly was; "If we can get 3% of the American market, we don't need the Canadian market."

Today, give the paperwork and shipping costs and small quantities ordered by Canadian buyers, I am not surprised it is difficult to keep stocked.

Moral of the story - when you see a good price, buy a few CASES - not boxes.

 

[P of PDent]

...have an online store that sells many types of ammo at decent price? Pretty much all the online stores here are either "back order" or "special order" on most of their items (sometimes all of them).

Others have very limited choices with relatively high price or ridiculous shipping charges ($45 for a single box of ammo? really?).

Is the market too small for anyone to bother to open a decent online store for ammo in Canada?


*hint* If you open a decent ammo store right now, you won't have to bother about competition, because it's basically nonexistent.

Sorry so many people jumped all over you about your post as this was also my first reaction. Before I got into this business I wondered the same things that you posted. Having been in the guns and ammo business for several years I have learned many things. The biggest issue in Canada is still SUPPLY! We have numerous orders with numerous manufacturers and distributors and will essentially take any ammo available at any reasonable cost. Some customers have noted our prices seem a little higher than some competitors but also note that we almost always have it in stock. To maintain constant supply we buy big and often and cost average our ammo so that we can maintain any inventory to supply the market. If there is any other way (other than the feast or famine model(lower prices when a big direct shipment comes in and then nothing for several months) I would like to know about it. This is the best situation we know about and we carry a few million rounds in stock at any given time. Phil.

 

[dizzy]

Heck retailers are buying from retailers just to keep their regular's happy. P of P&D hit the nail on the head, retailers buy ALL they can when they can.