Is it "unethical" for a gun shop to raise prices during a shortage? - Page 4

wayneinFL · January 31, 2013, 11:25 PM

MSRP is something the manufacturer made up to make his product to support a high retail price. It's pretty much arbitrary. It's really just a gimmick for sales promotion.

The real price that a seller should get is whatever buyers are willing to pay.

The more people are demanding a product, the higher the price will be. Higher price means more people are willing to supply the product.

My AR lowers would have sat in the closet for years at "MSRP". When the price doubled or tripled on them, I was willing to supply them to the market. Your communist philosophy says that I should have only priced them at an arbitrary number set by someone in an office somewhere. Or less. So they would have stayed in the closet.

This is why there were bread lines in the Soviet Union. This is why there is an empty ammo counter at Wal-mart.

nazshooter · February 1, 2013, 01:06 AM

Wayne:
Well put. Locally the Walmart and other big box stores haven't increased prices much, if at all. As a result every new shipment of ammo is quickly bought up and much of it is then resold in the smaller shops or on Backpage etc at the real market price. If they had just raised the prices there would be ammo on the shelves past 8am and maybe they could even afford to offer ammo makers more money to increase production further.

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OcelotZ3 · February 2, 2013, 01:10 AM

The store is in business to make money. Because of the shortage, they don't have much to sell and often have no idea when new stock might be coming in. If they price items at "normal" prices, they sell out for less than they could get and now they have nothing to sell.

If they raise prices, then that makes up for the loss of stock. But if they raise them too much people stop buying at all and then the prices will eventually fall.

Since the items that they are raising the prices on aren't life support related like water, batteries, etc. that might go up when preparing for a hurricane, I have no problem with it.

STW · February 4, 2013, 02:55 PM

Look at an auction to see how the market sets the price. When this all blew up I had a nephew that put a 3-pack of 30 round magazines on Gunbroker with a start price of $0.01. He sat back and watched it sell for around $240. That worked so well he sold another 3-pack but saner heads prevailed and he only got $150 for that one. He then bought a plane ticket and went to his sister's wedding. He forced no one to bid, no one to buy.

February 4, 2013, 02:55 PM	#79
STW Senior Member Join Date: June 15, 2002 Location: Montana Posts: 147	Look at an auction to see how the market sets the price. When this all blew up I had a nephew that put a 3-pack of 30 round magazines on Gunbroker with a start price of $0.01. He sat back and watched it sell for around $240. That worked so well he sold another 3-pack but saner heads prevailed and he only got $150 for that one. He then bought a plane ticket and went to his sister's wedding. He forced no one to bid, no one to buy. __________________ "What kind of man would put a known criminal in charge of a major branch of government? Apart from, say, the average voter." - Terry Pratchett

January 31, 2013, 11:25 PM	#76
wayneinFL Senior Member Join Date: December 18, 2004 Posts: 1,944	MSRP is something the manufacturer made up to make his product to support a high retail price. It's pretty much arbitrary. It's really just a gimmick for sales promotion. The real price that a seller should get is whatever buyers are willing to pay. The more people are demanding a product, the higher the price will be. Higher price means more people are willing to supply the product. My AR lowers would have sat in the closet for years at "MSRP". When the price doubled or tripled on them, I was willing to supply them to the market. Your communist philosophy says that I should have only priced them at an arbitrary number set by someone in an office somewhere. Or less. So they would have stayed in the closet. This is why there were bread lines in the Soviet Union. This is why there is an empty ammo counter at Wal-mart.

February 1, 2013, 01:06 AM	#77
nazshooter Senior Member Join Date: November 7, 2008 Posts: 151	Wayne: Well put. Locally the Walmart and other big box stores haven't increased prices much, if at all. As a result every new shipment of ammo is quickly bought up and much of it is then resold in the smaller shops or on Backpage etc at the real market price. If they had just raised the prices there would be ammo on the shelves past 8am and maybe they could even afford to offer ammo makers more money to increase production further. Sent from my ADR6425LVW using Tapatalk 2

February 2, 2013, 01:10 AM	#78
OcelotZ3 Senior Member Join Date: March 20, 2008 Posts: 229	The store is in business to make money. Because of the shortage, they don't have much to sell and often have no idea when new stock might be coming in. If they price items at "normal" prices, they sell out for less than they could get and now they have nothing to sell. If they raise prices, then that makes up for the loss of stock. But if they raise them too much people stop buying at all and then the prices will eventually fall. Since the items that they are raising the prices on aren't life support related like water, batteries, etc. that might go up when preparing for a hurricane, I have no problem with it.