NEW FRANKEN, WI (WTAQ) — There’s been an ammo shortage across the United States that has lasted several months, and it’s only gotten worse in the last few weeks.
Guns and ammunition saw a massive spike in sales around the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in March that has continued and intensified amidst rioting in major cities over the summer and ahead of the election. That’s led to shortages of both guns and ammunition.
“There’s a really high demand, and supply kind of stayed where it was at,” explained Scott Virlee, owner of Virlee Gunworks in New Franken. “There are a lot of people in a panic right now.”
That panic is especially amplified among hunters. The nine-day gun deer season starts Saturday, and popular hunting ammunition is hard to keep in stock.
“30-06, .270, .308, .243, all of them are really difficult. They’ve been really difficult the last four to six weeks,” Virlee told WTAQ. “Our phones are ringing off the hook all day with people looking for different types of ammo, but unfortunately there’s not a whole lot out there.”
Virlee says the rush started with handguns and handgun ammo, with the price of 9mm ammunition–the most common type of self-defense handgun round–jumping by nearly 70%. The rush later spread to shotguns and rifles.
A lot of it is driven by new buyers.
“I’d say at least 25% of people coming in for handguns or some type of personal defense firearm are new,” said Virlee.
The scarcity of ammo isn’t expected to stop an expected half-a-million hunters from hitting the woods this weekend in hopes of taking a deer.
