Cartridge price increases now getting silly

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Mad dog

Well-known member
Joined
Jun 10, 2021
Messages
46
Bought last batch April & yesterday called into my usual gun shop to pick up more only to find that now they have gone up by £8.20 for a slab of 250 that’s £32.80 for 1000. 😩😩😩

 
Its crazy. They can blame covid,  Ukraine war what ever other excuses they can make up. But its extortion. And every gunshop saying they going up again this month (June). Last year fiocchi f black were on average €250 a k. They are now from €310+ depending where you buy them, and if you can get them,  serious shortages of different cartridges at moment. Going up to €360 this month.  €100 price increase on a thousand cartridges in a year!! No way there is any excuse for that.. am I right to believe fiocchi are now loading fiocchi in layvale factory as we speak I know they bought out express,  do people think the price will come down?? There is no way ordinary working man can justify buying cartridges up to €400 to break Clay's..  what is really going on??

 
whatever reasons we are told  regarding prices ,  it eventually becomes too expensive to shoot clays ,   small shoots and cartridge manufacturers will eventually close ,  i  am a working class  man   but finding it hard to justify  the cost  !!     prices will never go down  so best enjoy while we can      what is your limit ?    £££

 
Already at my limit, shooting once a month when it used to be weekly, (well 5 if you count the straw bailer one see below).

Grounds loose out and eventually so do the manufacturers.

It just need one of them to bring a a good budget cart and they will sell, like lightspeed, oh hang on they've just gone up again 😄

When you add up 4 times a month, plus clays, travel to shooting grounds it mounts up. No wonder a local straw bailer shoot near me(can't really call it that as it's well run and organised) £12 for 50clays member, or £15 non member has close to 100 people there a week, pity it's only for a few months in the summer.

 
I'm sure it isn't in the cartridge manufacturer interest to cripple shooting folk with such high rising price increases because obviously less shooting less sales. Although it would seem there is alot of jumping on the band wagon when it comes to huge price increases on everything these days. €350 to €400 for a thousand clay cartridges is not sustainable in the long run for most people especially when the cost of every day living has increased dramatically as well.  I wonder are they rising in price so sharply in Italy,  Spain, France where most of cartridge are manufactured??

It also would not be in gun manufacturing industry for the price of cartridges to become ridiculously high,  for obvious reasons. 

 
It's been talked about but not a single shoot I attend has raised the cost of their clays yet. 

But somehow cartridges need to go up 10% every six months.

Buy the cheapest imported brands you can find would be my advice. We as consumers can dictate the market if we try.

PM.

 
Already at my limit, shooting once a month when it used to be weekly, (well 5 if you count the straw bailer one see below).

Grounds loose out and eventually so do the manufacturers.

It just need one of them to bring a a good budget cart and they will sell, like lightspeed, oh hang on they've just gone up again 😄

When you add up 4 times a month, plus clays, travel to shooting grounds it mounts up. No wonder a local straw bailer shoot near me(can't really call it that as it's well run and organised) £12 for 50clays member, or £15 non member has close to 100 people there a week, pity it's only for a few months in the summer.
That’s exactly my plan of attack I don’t want to stop shooting but will go now once a month instead of most weekends I just can’t justify the cost anymore I can then also cancel my membership at my club & shoot as a non member. But if cartridge prices continue to go up at this pace I will simply just give up clay shooting.

 
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To be fair I was using a mid range cartridge (Cheddite smart strike) and paying £62 a slab prior to price increases, changed to a budget shell (eley select) and now paying £60 a slab after price increases, there a great shell for everything other than long range edgy stuff, glass half full for me.

 
No such thing as a cheap cartridge here any more.  eley Olympic, €300 at the minute , Tunnet universal €300,Chediddte universal €300, fiocchi tt one €305 all going to rise in price again shortly. they would be classed as budget cartridges here, and more than good enough for me to break clays.  But  are €70 to €100 more expensive than last year. Crazy 

 
Sadly clay shooting will become a sport for the rich or at least the comfortably well off

I just stocked up on 5 slabs of the cheapest shell I could find locally - fiocchi TT1 @£221/1000 but only available in 9’s. 

I asked when they would be getting any more and the answer as no idea. OOS across the country and according to my RFD the manufacturer are focusing production on higher priced cartridges at the moment. Presumably to either force us us to upgrade and pay even more, or to kill the sport all together 

I know inflation is high but something  doesn’t add up, to be outstripping inflation by so much  

 
No such thing as a cheap cartridge here any more.  eley Olympic, €300 at the minute , Tunnet universal €300,Chediddte universal €300, fiocchi tt one €305 all going to rise in price again shortly. they would be classed as budget cartridges here, and more than good enough for me to break clays.  But  are €70 to €100 more expensive than last year. Crazy 
Where is ‘ here’ , Pothunter? I’m across the Channel and have to pay for cartridges in Euro’s too (NL) but while we have seem some pretty steep increases it doesn’t (yet) seem to be as bad as Blighty. 

 
Where is ‘ here’ , Pothunter? I’m across the Channel and have to pay for cartridges in Euro’s too (NL) but while we have seem some pretty steep increases it doesn’t (yet) seem to be as bad as Blighty. 
Republic of Ireland 

 
You are then likely double as lucky, getting cartridges from the UK that are then exported and converted to Euro… We are still well south of 300 for the likes of Tunnet and the most common Mirage, Gamebore and such with most being at 250 ish a 1000. For as long as that ll last anyway…

 
Few weeks back one was earwigging a conversation between some old or shall we say very long time shoots, they were to a man adamant that over their lifetime shooting has got less expensive when benchmarking against income, think we can all see its far more accessible than ever. Its never been a cheap sport / pastime and am in the camp that rightly or wrongly its not (due to cost) a pastime for the "youngsters".

The vast majority of incomers (with the disposable income to support it) to this hobby are all past the first flush of youth finding shooting later in life and rather enjoying a very much under the radar hobby thats far more pleasing than most individual / team sports can be once the body / reactions been to wane.

The vast majority of shooting in this part of the country is the once a week / fortnight straw baler type and they all look to be unaffected, for most of them its a jolly morning out, those of us that frequent 6/7 day a week grounds and/or shoot competition are a minority, the former may be getting quiet the latter has been booming these last few years so some sort of correction is likely, clay bashing will though still go on in its various forms.

 
I have been told the same that shooting is comparatively cheaper nowadays, registered sporting is pretty rammed in East Anglia and I believe that will continue. I have also heard that people will stop shooting at expensive clay grounds and frequent cheaper straw balers, having tried a couple myself recently I would much rather pay the premium and shoot better targets with better facilities even if it meant shooting less, I wont be revisiting the straw balers any time soon.

 
I agree Charlie . What rising prices do is make you very discerning about what you point your gun at . On Friday I went out to a local( ish ) ground , specifically to shoot high tower birds . Oly blues bought at £238 , going to cost £250 to replace .
On one stand  The traps were throwing perhaps one no bird in four or five pulls . Another stand my card would not stay in place to activate the Claymate . I put my gun away and went home .

Shot at  Thimbleby today , testing targets , reliably thrown , great facilities . The place was very busy . 

I think if things get tight grounds that don’t provide excellent challenging targets without issues will lose out to the ones that do . 

 
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The "it's never been cheaper" argument the manufacturers use doesn't stack up.

Cartridges back in the day were hand loaded by men and women stood at presses, hand dipped in varnish and hand packed.

The whole process in a modern set up is now fully automated with machines capable of producing thousands of shells an hour.

Most firms are now backed by huge multi nationals so even the initial outlay for the machines won't hurt.

PM. 

 

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