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Some good news...... At the recent US open....Sparta, IL (week ago). The local Walmart had a skid of Winchester AA's and another of Universals on the floor. No limit sales. All the state trap shoots have shells available by vendor (wholesaler). Shot MO a few weeks ago and KS all this week, NE 2 weeks later. Large attendance at MO (over 600 shooters just on Sat.), record pre-squad for events at KS. Would guess the same for NE.

Shells are going to large competitive events.

Maltz
 
There are over 700 shooters already signed up for the 2022 US Open at Hemingway's place in SC, almost a year away.
 
could the big numbers just be a surge caused by it all being closed for so long....making everyone rush the gates to shoot again...only to have it scale back as time passes?
 
Bob, the sporting folks love these big shoots - it's a chance to shoot some of the best targets, shoot with or watch some of the best shooters, shop some of the top vendors. It's as much a social event as a shooting one - or it can be if you want it to be.
 
The big shoots are well attended by more serious shooters. This year Ive attended MO state trap shoot, Ks state trap shoot and several from the club just returned from NE. NE ran out of shells early. All had record crowds. It is the smaller clubs short on participation. The local club shooters that have purchased shells they need for the week at Walmart or some other local provider are having problems finding ammo. Not showing up for leagues and derbies.

Those of us that buy one or two years ahead have ammo and hopefully by the time we have need, inventory will be available. We also have ammo at the club for those shooting it there. We purchased ammo one year ahead. Started this shortage with 4 pallets, now down to 1. Loading components have been available, but short on primers. Shot and wads are available on demand, not all powders are available, but not a problem if your willing to buy what is.

Maltz
 
Assurances from ammo makers that their factories are "running 24/7" doesn't tell the whole story.

What were they running before the ammo shortage? Without that number, we have no idea of what a "24/7" schedule means in the way of increased capacity. Is it 25%? 10%? 1%?

America's latest fad business management technique is to not maintain any reserve capacity at all, because unused capacity is the enemy. This ignores the possibility that demand may exceed supply and nothing can be done short-term to fix this.

It does no good to have cheap ammo if none is available.
 
Zbigniew said:
Assurances from ammo makers that their factories are "running 24/7" doesn't tell the whole story.

What were they running before the ammo shortage? Without that number, we have no idea of what a "24/7" schedule means in the way of increased capacity. Is it 25%? 10%? 1%?

America's latest fad business management technique is to not maintain any reserve capacity at all, because unused capacity is the enemy. This ignores the possibility that demand may exceed supply and nothing can be done short-term to fix this.
It tells all of the story that needs to be told.

Ammunition and component manufacturers have exploited every bit of capacity that makes financial sense. They have navigated this insanity as best as possible.

Lean Manufacturing and JIT isn't the "latest fad" in business management. It's been one of the most prominent and successful manufacturing methods used in this country since it was developed and published in the early 90's (based on TPS principles). And absolutely, unused capacity (waste) is an enemy of manufacturing, and always will be.
 
Ssanders224 said:
Zbigniew said:
Assurances from ammo makers that their factories are "running 24/7" doesn't tell the whole story.

What were they running before the ammo shortage? Without that number, we have no idea of what a "24/7" schedule means in the way of increased capacity. Is it 25%? 10%? 1%?

America's latest fad business management technique is to not maintain any reserve capacity at all, because unused capacity is the enemy. This ignores the possibility that demand may exceed supply and nothing can be done short-term to fix this.
It tells all of the story that needs to be told.

Ammunition and component manufacturers have exploited every bit of capacity that makes financial sense. They have navigated this insanity as best as possible.

Lean Manufacturing and JIT isn't the "latest fad" in business management. It's been one of the most prominent and successful manufacturing methods used in this country since it was developed and published in the early 90's (based on TPS principles). And absolutely, unused capacity (waste) is an enemy of manufacturing, and always will be.
JIT and similar can be traced back to what Deming did for the Japanese going back to after WWII
When you take into account Remington was basically shutdown for quite some time, and other factories were short of workers and materials due to Covid, everything worked against them.
 
oneounceload said:
Ssanders224 said:
Zbigniew said:
Assurances from ammo makers that their factories are "running 24/7" doesn't tell the whole story.

What were they running before the ammo shortage? Without that number, we have no idea of what a "24/7" schedule means in the way of increased capacity. Is it 25%? 10%? 1%?

America's latest fad business management technique is to not maintain any reserve capacity at all, because unused capacity is the enemy. This ignores the possibility that demand may exceed supply and nothing can be done short-term to fix this.
It tells all of the story that needs to be told.

Ammunition and component manufacturers have exploited every bit of capacity that makes financial sense. They have navigated this insanity as best as possible.

Lean Manufacturing and JIT isn't the "latest fad" in business management. It's been one of the most prominent and successful manufacturing methods used in this country since it was developed and published in the early 90's (based on TPS principles). And absolutely, unused capacity (waste) is an enemy of manufacturing, and always will be.
JIT and similar can be traced back to what Deming did for the Japanese going back to after WWII
When you take into account Remington was basically shutdown for quite some time, and other factories were short of workers and materials due to Covid, everything worked against them.
It really was/is a perfect storm.

Copper strip in the alloys we commonly use in projectile and component manufacturing carried about a 4 week lead time from most suppliers 18 months ago. Currently, it's not uncommon for new orders to be 10-12 months out. Not to mention that costs are up about 125%.
 
Ssanders224 said:
Zbigniew said:
Assurances from ammo makers that their factories are "running 24/7" doesn't tell the whole story.

What were they running before the ammo shortage? Without that number, we have no idea of what a "24/7" schedule means in the way of increased capacity. Is it 25%? 10%? 1%?

America's latest fad business management technique is to not maintain any reserve capacity at all, because unused capacity is the enemy. This ignores the possibility that demand may exceed supply and nothing can be done short-term to fix this.
It tells all of the story that needs to be told.

Ammunition and component manufacturers have exploited every bit of capacity that makes financial sense. They have navigated this insanity as best as possible.

Lean Manufacturing and JIT isn't the "latest fad" in business management. It's been one of the most prominent and successful manufacturing methods used in this country since it was developed and published in the early 90's (based on TPS principles). And absolutely, unused capacity (waste) is an enemy of manufacturing, and always will be.
JIT and Lean are the biggest crocks of horse manure to ever be sold to short-term profit-minded executives who then order their engineers to 'make it work'. I have SEEN, first hand, the problems caused by that the moment ANY kind of issue upsets the apple cart. They CAN produce greater profits in the short term IF, and ONLY if, no part of the supply chain has a hiccup. No one said you have to have extra factories standing idly by. OTOH, you can't expect a factory running at 'peak' efficiency (24/7) to have any ability to keep pace with a short-term surge, either. That's where keeping some inventory, virtually an obscenity not to be spoken by anyone who's bitten the JIT and Lean lure, comes into play. Then you don't have to hang out the 'sold out' sign and cause senseless panic buying.

Introduced in the '90s? Have you noticed that these 'shortages' began happening at just about that same time?

So again, press releases saying "Our factories are running 24/7" doesn't tell anybody anything.
 
Zbigniew said:
Ssanders224 said:
Zbigniew said:
Assurances from ammo makers that their factories are "running 24/7" doesn't tell the whole story.

What were they running before the ammo shortage? Without that number, we have no idea of what a "24/7" schedule means in the way of increased capacity. Is it 25%? 10%? 1%?

America's latest fad business management technique is to not maintain any reserve capacity at all, because unused capacity is the enemy. This ignores the possibility that demand may exceed supply and nothing can be done short-term to fix this.
It tells all of the story that needs to be told.

Ammunition and component manufacturers have exploited every bit of capacity that makes financial sense. They have navigated this insanity as best as possible.

Lean Manufacturing and JIT isn't the "latest fad" in business management. It's been one of the most prominent and successful manufacturing methods used in this country since it was developed and published in the early 90's (based on TPS principles). And absolutely, unused capacity (waste) is an enemy of manufacturing, and always will be.
JIT and Lean are the biggest crocks of horse manure to ever be sold to short-term profit-minded executives who then order their engineers to 'make it work'. I have SEEN, first hand, the problems caused by that the moment ANY kind of issue upsets the apple cart. They CAN produce greater profits in the short term IF, and ONLY if, no part of the supply chain has a hiccup. No one said you have to have extra factories standing idly by. OTOH, you can't expect a factory running at 'peak' efficiency (24/7) to have any ability to keep pace with a short-term surge, either. That's where keeping some inventory, virtually an obscenity not to be spoken by anyone who's bitten the JIT and Lean lure, comes into play. Then you don't have to hang out the 'sold out' sign and cause senseless panic buying.

Introduced in the '90s? Have you noticed that these 'shortages' began happening at just about that same time?
Umm... What are you talking about?
It's obvious you have almost no understanding of how the ammunition industry and it's distribution chains function. There is literally nothing manufacturers could have done differently that would have prevented or even stifled what has occurred over the last 15 months.

Sure, Lean/JIT/TPS/TOC/etc. methods get implemented and managed poorly sometimes. It's not easy. But to dismiss them as horse manure is pure naivete.

Zbigniew said:
That's where keeping some inventory, virtually an obscenity not to be spoken by anyone who's bitten the JIT and Lean lure, comes into play. Then you don't have to hang out the 'sold out' sign and cause senseless panic buying.
You're completely out of your lane. You obviously have NO idea of what occurred.
Insinuating that planning large scale manufacturing and inventory around possible unforeseen short term surges in demand is misguided at best.

Zbigniew said:
So again, press releases saying "Our factories are running 24/7" doesn't tell anybody anything.
What makes you think they owe you any explanation at all? They don't.

Look, the entire "inventory" discussion went completely out the window two days into this mess. Quite literally all the available domestic inventory in the industry was spoken for the first week. Even if that inventory was DOUBLE what it was, it may have bought another week of time at best... and here we are 15 months later. So that whole presupposition is moot.
 
Enjoy your shortages. There will be more if nothing changes in the manufacturing/inventory philosophy being used today. Every time a cow pisses on a flat rock, the shelves will be empty.
 
Zbigniew said:
Enjoy your shortages. There will be more if nothing changes in the manufacturing/inventory philosophy being used today. Every time a cow pisses on a flat rock, the shelves will be empty.
Your premise is so misplaced it makes it hard to know how to begin responding to it.

- No ammunition company is going to purposefully add waste to their manufacturing, period.

- Even if they wanted to give that a go, do you have any clue what transpired over the last 15 months? Billions of dollars worth of backorders were amassed by companies in the first few months of the craze. So exactly how much "extra" inventory would have made any significant difference at all? You could have had an extra $50 million worth of ammo sitting in a magic warehouse and it would have barely been a blip on the radar.

- Lastly, even if they could, it's not really the manufacturers responsibility to prevent a "shortage". The idea that they should somehow stay prepared to buffer the industry against some unforeseen historic spike in demand is neat-o, but not realistic.
 
Lets make this simple, per CEO of Remington they are running wide open "24/7". Anybody se STS or Gun Club shells for sale? I haven't seen either sence CEO reported 24/7 production. I've been able to buy Fed top gun, Win AA, Win universal, and Fiochi but no Rem
 
I'll add a little more to the discussion....

Powder is more unavailable right now than it's been throughout this entire situation. And I mean at the mill level. I had a conversation with the National Sales Managers of one of the largest powder distributors in the country today, and raw material availability and manufacturing capacity (due to crippled workforce at the mills) are the current issues. Powder is all but unavailable at the OEM level at this point.

Also, as of today, one of the major copper suppliers to the ammunition industry (jackets, cases, shell heads, etc) is not accepting new POs. They are booked so far out, that new orders are not being taken.

I say all that to say, that this is a complex issue, and there is no "easy" button. There is no "answer" to the situation.
 
If I'm a CEO, and I make a statement "running 24/7", that should mean their consumable supply train is supporting 24/7 production. If the "24/7" statement is accurate the product must be going somewhere other than my three or four state area. With 40 years of operation in the manufacturing field (galv. Steel) I know what an upset to the supply train means. Most of my customers (auto mfg.) were on the leading edge of just in time delivery and worshiped at the altar of Demming.
 
kyskeet said:
Lets make this simple, per CEO of Remington they are running wide open "24/7". Anybody se STS or Gun Club shells for sale? I haven't seen either sence CEO reported 24/7 production. I've been able to buy Fed top gun, Win AA, Win universal, and Fiochi but no Rem
Have seen Remington at Walmart and BASS; guess you aren't seeing what I am.

Lean manufacturing doesn't go back to the 90s - that is idiocy; it goes back to post WWII and Deming with Japan. and it encompasses a lot more than having inventory in the pipeline.
I only dealt in this side of supply chain for 25+ years so what do I know?
 
oneounceload said:
Lean manufacturing doesn't go back to the 90s - that is idiocy; it goes back to post WWII and Deming with Japan. and it encompasses a lot more than having inventory in the pipeline.
I only dealt in this side of supply chain for 25+ years so what do I know?
Well then surely you know that the term "lean Production/manufacturing" wasn't coined by Krafcik until 1988, and that the publication of "The Machine That Changed The World" (1990) is widely regarded as the beginning of the "Lean Production" movement.

Of course many of the principles started with, or have their roots in Ford's systems, Deming's contributions in Japan, etc, etc.... but it's not as simple as saying Lean comes from "Deming and Japan".

I'm intimately familiar with the specific history and implementation of most popular manufacturing strategies, so don't be so quick to throw the "idiocy" term out, as you might end up inadvertently applying it to yourself.

To follow your argue from authority logic...
My education and background is in Industrial Engineering, I've visited and studied numerous manufacturing facilities around the country and abroad, and I currently manage a projectile and ammunition manufacturing and distribution company... so "what do I know"?
 
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