Is the run on guns over? Or is this just a summer lull? (6/4/2009)

Brady's Sportmans Surplus in Missoula, MT has nearly full ammo shelves for the first time in months.

Recently stocked gun store shelves and quickly lowering gun sales seem to indicate the gun buying craze is nearly over.

Starting in October of 2008 gun and ammunition purchases started to increase at a brisk pace. By December 2008 many calibers of handgun and rifle cartridges were starting to become hard to find. By January 2009, if you could find any ammo for common guns, you'd be lucky. The only place to get ammo was at a gun show, or to patiently wait for a backorder to be filled.

This higher-than-normal level of gun and ammunition sales continued until about mid-way through May 2009. All of a sudden ammo has started to trickle in, or perhaps just isn't selling as quickly.

Brady's Sportman's Surplus in Missoula has close to fully stocked shelves for the first time in 3 months. A quick inspection of the shelves shows they have nearly all the major calibers in stock, except .357 Mag. It's been this way for 2 weeks now. Most of the brands are obscure, but still its ammo. The friendly folks at Brady's concur, saying "ammo sales have started to slow down, even though we have pretty modest prices".

Looking at GunBroker.com is also telling. There are now pages and pages of ammunition for sale for most of the popular brands, with little or no bids. A month ago, you'd be lucky to find any ammo without at least a bid or two.

FBI NICS Background Checks Slowing Down

Another gauge worth taking a look at is the FBI NICS (National Instant Criminal Background Check System) Background Checks. This system is used by Federal Firearms Licensees (FFLs) to instantly determine whether a prospective buyer is eligible to buy firearms or explosives. The FBI publishes a list of NICS checks at the end of each month. Keep in mind this is only a measure of the number of background checks, not actual sales, but it still should be a relatively useful tool for determining overall consumer interest levels.

NICS Checks November 2007 to May 2009

NICS Checks for 2008 in general were much higher than normal. November and December 2008 were the two highest months for NICS checks ever. Looking at the graph above, you'll see that from there on it dropped immediately but was still higher than the same month the year before. Does this mean the sales frenzy is over? We need too look at the big picture for a better understanding.

Overall NICS Checks have been increasing since they were started in Nov 1998. Looking at the accumulated 10 years of data itself is interesting, because several trends make themselves apparent. First off is that November and December are always the two highest months of the year, indicating Christmas season sales. This is always followed by a significant drop in January, and then a slow uptake again in March and April, possibly due to tax returns. Then there is a slow downward slide in sales until July when they make a slow climb until October.

Looking at the overall 10 year data (below) does indicate that the drop in NICS Checks are following basically the same pattern. However, if you look at the level of decline starting in March 2009 (red line), compared to the previous years, you'll notice that it becomes drastically steeper between April and May of 2009 compared to the previous 10 years.

NICS Checks 1998 - 2009

Why the sudden drop in gun checks? And why are the ammo sales starting to dip down? One redditor sums it up nicely "We're all out of money and we've maxed out our credit cards....."

Only time will tell, but this seems to be good news for Gun Enthusiasts who'd like to be able to afford shooting again.

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