The Collapse of the AR-15 Assault Weapon Market

[Gunner3456]

Everything I've read the past couple of years led me to believe that the number of gun owners was increasing, and that a lot of beginners were taking lessons. Maybe that was anecdotal and not factual, I dunno.

I do know that a hill of a lot of guns and ammo were sold the past couple of years. Those statistics are out there repeatedly.

 

[Phillyfan]

I don't view gun ownership to be about hunting at all. I haven't shot an animal since I was 12 and I am not about to re-start. Gangbangers and jihadis? Let's just say if there is ever a bounty I know lots more people who'd go for that license rather than a tag.

Hunting is in decline in part because it is not relevant to most shooters. It's quaint and Fuddish. Action shooting, even in the guise of nostalgia, like the SASS, has been explosively growing relative to hunting. Don't need state permission, don't need property access other than belonging to a range, doesn't require lots of travel, and won't get you zapped by a buck fevered idiot.

This is a fairly myopic view IMOP. I can't see how you can say gun ownership isn't about hunting "at all?" I mean for some people it is, so it has to be at least part of why people own guns, right? You might not feel it is a large part, or that it isn't as significant as your reasoning for owning a firearm, but please don't belittle those of us who still choose to be "quaint and fuddish."

 

[Boats]

It's just that people conflate gun ownership with hunting.

"If hunting is dropping in popularity gun ownership must follow suit."

That is a logical fallacy. The hunters come out every fall, most grayer than the year before, put at best one box through the rifle zeroing it, and most one never sees again until the following hunting season unless they are into trap/skeet and wing shooting too.

When I was a kid coming up in Wallowa County, hunting was a huge deal. Every boy had at least a .243 for deer season and we all took hunter's safety classes, went to hunting camp, etcetera, and shot squirrels all summer, in my case with a well worn Stevens Favorite.

Now it's mostly moribund, even when I get back to the old hunting grounds. When I was a kid there wasn't anything else to do. That is not a problem these days almost everywhere.

So sorry for calling it Fuddish, but hunting is quaint and there is too much drinking done around these trips for my tastes. I am not for banning it or anything of the sort, but I'd never ever tell anyone I own firearms so that I may go hunting. I did go once again a few years ago to an elk camp, but I didn't go to hunt, I went to glass for a buddy.

I am part of the decline of hunting, but not of any correlative drop in gun ownership. My son is learning target shooting with a .22lr at the moment, but we won't be stalking the squirrels unless he signals an intention to put them on a spit.

 

[Phillyfan]

The hunters come out every fall, most grayer than the year before, put at best one box through the rifle zeroing it, and most one never sees again until the following hunting season unless they are into trap/skeet and wing shooting too.

I just get annoyed with blanket statements and stereotypes. No reason one person chooses to own a gun is any more, or less, important or valid than anyone elses. That is how I took your original statement, though I am sure that is not what you intended.

 

[Boats]

Our "points," as they are, intersect. The "why" people own firearms is unimportant to both you and me apparently. "Hunting being in decline" is a big deal for antis. I couldn't care less if hunting died out, it has no bearing on why I own firearms.

I was originally responding in part to this contention by 2506:

My take on all this is: it's just like hunters--the numbers decline each year.

It's not just like hunters. Hunting figures are easily tracked through the issuance of tags and demographic information is gleaned from the applications. General gun buying can only be tracked indirectly through NICS data and BATFE production/import data.

Or it can be inferred from publicly held company's 10k filings:

Ruger Unit Production of firearms, 98+% of their total business:

2009--934,200
2008--626,500
2007--481,800

And in 2009, they couldn't meet demand, facing 958,700 orders from distributors and suffering a back order carryover into this year.

http://www.ruger.com/corporate/PDF/10K-2009.pdf

S&W's 10k filing doesn't break down by unit, but here is an interesting blurb.

Despite weakness in the overall economy, our handgun and tactical rifle sales experienced growth throughout the first half of fiscal 2009. We began to experience very strong consumer demand for our handguns and tactical rifle products beginning in our third fiscal quarter. We believe this increased demand was related to multiple factors, including heightened fears of terrorism and crime, speculation surrounding increased gun control, and a new administration taking office in Washington, D.C. We are unable to assess whether or for how long the increase in consumer demand will last or whether the orders constituting our backlog will be cancelled if consumer demand decreases. The demand for these products was much larger than our ability to produce, and our backlog grew from $20 million in our second quarter to more than $123 million in our third quarter to more than $268 million at the end of our fiscal year. Excluding the impact of hunting products, sales for fiscal 2009 grew 29.5% over sales for similar products in fiscal 2008.

http://ir.smith-wesson.com/phoenix...yZXBvPXRlbmsmaXBhZ2U9NjQwMDM3NCZhdHRhY2g9T04=

There's going to be a future load of folks out there not telling NORC about any of this activity and not applying for doe tags either.

 

[longcolt]

Lets see...............hummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, why are the number of hunters dropping in Oregon. Pick up the 209-2010 Oregon Game Bird Regulations and the 2010 Oregon Big Game Regulations. It reads like the friggin IRS tax code!!! Who the heck wants to deal with the cost of all the stamps and no guarantee of a pick in the drawings.

Plus you have to turn in the left testicle of your squirrel to the Dept of Game within 15 min of shooting it or get fined $100. Now I understand that my analogy is ridiculous but its an example of the over regulation of the whole mess. Only the dedicated hunters that know the areas well want to continue to deal with Fish and Game Admin rules anymore.

But that plays well into the agenda of the environmental takeover of the state. They prefer to keep the hiking trails free of dangerous hunters.

The AR-15's are now available and easy to find, prices are somewhat better but nobody is giving anything away. If you look close at an AR you see stamped parts and you know those are very cheap to produce, so I have always wondered why an AR costs so much more that a nice Savage Bolt action, or a Ruger mini-14? Don't see the value there but I do understand they are fun to play with.

 

[Riot]

Where are these wherehouses full of AR-15s that nobody wants? Cause I want one!

 

[torpedoman]

All bubbles bust sooner or later.

 

[torpedoman]

Leftist spin on "Assault Weapons." What a tool..........:nuts:

The Collapse of the AR-15 Assault Weapon Market

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/josh-sugarmann/the-collapse-of-the-ar-15_b_485957.html

One of the greatest talents of the National Rifle Association and the gun industry has been their ability exploit high-profile events to pump up gun sales: Bill Clinton, the Brady Bill, the federal assault weapons "ban," Y2K, September 11th, and now, of course, Barack Obama. Regardless of the event, the solution remains the same: buy a gun. And if industry and gun fan mags are any indication, it should be an AR-15 assault rifle.

A fact left unstated by the gun lobby (and virtually unnoticed by the news media) is the fact that after gun sales rise, they eventually drop--sometimes precipitously. Sometimes, as Michael Kassnar, president of AR-15 manufacturer KBI/Charles Daly, explains, there's a "market collapse." Kassnar should know--he's just shut his business' doors.

According to the March 1, 2010, edition of theNew Gun Week:

One factor that contributed to the company's closure was what Kassner called a "collapse" of the market in mid-2009 for semiautomatic sport utility rifles, the so-called "black guns" designed on the AR-15 platform.

In other words, AR-15 assault rifles, but let us continue.

He said the rush to purchase those firearms came to a halt in about July, leaving him with a "warehouse full of guns nobody wanted."


Orders for about $8 million worth of firearms were canceled, he said, leaving KBI/Charles Daly essentially high and dry for the second half of the 2009 sales year. It appeared that the public became less fearful that the Obama administration was going to come after semi-autos, so the panic buying came to an end, Kassnar said....

"The consumer just stopped buying," he said....the "sales blitz lasted about eight months."

Not to worry. Despite the long-term trends of declining gun ownership in America's boom and bust gun manufacturing economy, the NRA and gun industry are always on the lookout for another manufactured crisis to exploit and reel in the "panic" buyer.

20-25 % unemployed and others worried about their jobs may have realized that peanut butter, jelly and bread might be a better investment than another gun,

 

[Phillyfan]

Lets see...............hummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, why are the number of hunters dropping in Oregon. Pick up the 209-2010 Oregon Game Bird Regulations and the 2010 Oregon Big Game Regulations. It reads like the friggin IRS tax code!!! Who the heck wants to deal with the cost of all the stamps and no guarantee of a pick in the drawings.

Plus you have to turn in the left testicle of your squirrel to the Dept of Game within 15 min of shooting it or get fined $100. Now I understand that my analogy is ridiculous but its an example of the over regulation of the whole mess. Only the dedicated hunters that know the areas well want to continue to deal with Fish and Game Admin rules anymore.

But that plays well into the agenda of the environmental takeover of the state. They prefer to keep the hiking trails free of dangerous hunters.

The AR-15's are now available and easy to find, prices are somewhat better but nobody is giving anything away. If you look close at an AR you see stamped parts and you know those are very cheap to produce, so I have always wondered why an AR costs so much more that a nice Savage Bolt action, or a Ruger mini-14? Don't see the value there but I do understand they are fun to play with.

This is so true. Unless you know somebody who knows where to go, when, and what is legal, it is very difficult to start hunting. I just started about 6 years ago, and I was lucky enough to have some old timers who were willing to show me the way. Very few new or young hunters out there.

 

[Scott]

I feel hunting is dropping in numbers because of the laws, cost of tags, rules, and land. I feel land is the biggest reason. Most of it seems to be mostly private and a lot of public land is shrinking every year.

 

[jordanvraptor]

Dang it! Now I'm stuck with two AR's... Maybe I can trade both of them in on half the price of an ACR...

 

[Gunner3456]

Maybe the aging of the baby boomers (a large part of our population) has something to do with any drop in hunting? I don't find it as exciting as I used to. I used to buy guns mostly suited to hunting, and now I buy guns more suited to self defense.

FWIW, I was in Bi Mart yesterday (Bear Creek Plaza, Medford) and they had lots of .22lr in Peters and Remington.

For the first time in a long time there was no real limit. The official limit was 4 bricks, but the guy told me I could buy more if I wanted. He said they had lots of it. For the past couple of years it's always been 2 bricks if they had it.

I bought 4 bricks to add to my "future barter" stash.

 

[rodell]

I feel hunting is dropping in numbers because of the laws, cost of tags, rules, and land. I feel land is the biggest reason. Most of it seems to be mostly private and a lot of public land is shrinking every year.

In general, there are just fewer people who want to hunt. There are other kids' activities, a greater percentage of the population is suburban, and, the time isn't spent there use to be.

I grew up in Upstate NY, very rural. The first day of deer season was a school holiday. Of course it isn't any more. In the area I hunted, I would see several hunters in a day, even on private land, and, hear a few shots. The last time I hunted there I only saw myself, and, heard nary a shot. There were plenty of deer; just no hunters.