Serious question: aren’t components hard to find now, too? Being able to load now means you had a lot of powder and primers from the good times, at the very least, and probably brass and bullets.
How is that different from just stacking factory ammo in the good times (aside from cost)?
Outside of primers, everything else is not nearly as hard to find as 9mm is. And most guys who reload have at least anywhere from 1-3 sleeves (5k/sleeve) of primers at any one given time, for something like small pistol primer. So when this shit hit in March, the "typical" centerfire pistol reloader, by then (most serious guys go full retard loading in Dec-Feb, because they're not shooting nearly as much) had already reloaded up his (insert however many thousand rounds for 2020 here) plus probably had a reserve of 5-10k in primers. Bullets are slow but not unobtainium. Having a season worth of shit hanging around at any one given time is not a "lot" of material, its SOP for most reloaders. Also remember, reloaders saw this train coming in early 2020, so the smart guys started zipping around and gathering extra shit last january or febuary and going balls to the wall, because they already KNEW what was coming. Remember that
before things got super-retarded, sleeves of primers were likely under 200 bucks.
Let's also do some simple math... if I set out an annual budget of say, like, a few grand for ammunition, or components. Guess who has more shit to shoot... the reloader or the guy doing strictly commercial? The guy reloading, on a bad day, has capability for at least 30% more ammunition than the typical shelf buyer does, maybe more, in some cases, for the same amount of money
spent. Sometimes its 50% or more if we're talking higher margin stuff (like big bore pistol calibers) or if the reloader is a big time skinflint (example, only huge large type skinflints even cast bullets for 9mm, lmao...)
I'm a bum and I'm not even "active" at reloading now, but having been through this game before, i I know that it makes a huge difference. Back during Obamascare 1 I did it and had I not
been handloading that year, there was no way in hell I could have afforded to shoot more than a couple of pin matches that year.