You may be familiar with the idiom, Fast, Good, or Cheap, pick any two. In the current firearms and accessories market, you may not get any of those choices.
While much of the U.S. has been experiencing a gun, magazine, ammo, and reloading component shortage, there’s been a secret among shooters at Arizona ranges. Quietly whispered among shooters, “Psst, you can still get all the gun powder, primers, and bullets you need at normal prices from Bruno Shooters Supply in Phoenix.” Pretty soon, the secret was out and Bruno was slammed with orders, just like every other company in the firearms industry. On an Arizona shooting forum, Amy Bruno explained why prices are skyrocketing, phone calls go unanswered, and orders are taking much longer to ship:
Hello All,
I do need to clear the air. The reason that our prices keep going up is because the manufacturers are rarely shipping anyone product. We need to buy it from whomever has it in stock. Because of this, we have to pay shipping charges and Haz-mat fee just like you. This is what is raising the prices. It has nothing to do with manufacturers’ price increases. It has to do with the increase in our true COST. We try to at least have stock for you to buy.
In regards to Jason (my brother), he is there. He took time for a honeymoon, but he is still there. In regards to heating and cooling, we do not own the building. We rent. We have only the swamp coolers that they provide. These do not work in the summer. In the winter, we have one little heater. I am sorry that the climate is unbearable. It is for us too. Also, we never accept your payment without giving you a total first.
In regards to our hours, we are open from 8am-5pm Monday thru Friday. Sometimes we leave 5 minutes early. Sometimes we stay 4 hours late. We do not have the staff to be open all day every day.
Now onto the phone situation. As many of you know there are only 4 of us there. We have chosen to leave the door open to walk in customers and not accept calls.
As of today, we have over 2000 orders (we now measure in reams of paper). We are at least 2 weeks behind in even looking at your order. Once we get to it, if we are out of something, we will call or I will email you. Assuming most of you are local, this will not apply to you but I will say it anyway. Orders for non HAZ-MAT (powder and/or primers) orders will ship in about a week as long as everything is in stock. Orders for primers and anything else BESIDES powder will ship in about 3 weeks. Orders with Powder and any other item will ship in about 6 weeks. The reason for this is because no vehicle can have more than 100 pounds of smokeless powder on it. This means UPS. We have already 2 trucks coming daily. This means we can ship 200 pounds of powder a day. Considering the circumstances, this is a drop in the bucket.
We are not accepting calls because we cannot get to our orders if we do. We would be unable to wait on customers if we do. Next to go is the website and as a last resort, we will lock the door to walk-in customers until we can get caught up. We are trying to avoid both of these situations and are doing the very best that we can. We ask that you do not call or come in or email to check order status until at least 3 weeks have passed. We will contact you, we promise. We also have chosen not to ration or hit you with limits like the other stores. We may not be well-lit, or temperature controlled. We may not have a public restroom or lots of parking. But at least we have things that you need (most of the time) in stock so you can shoot.
Thanks for understanding,
Amy Bruno
Bruno Shooters Supply
I think Ms. Bruno’s honest explanation applies to the current industry-wide shortages of firearms and components. Major national dealers have also struggled with providing accurate inventory availability online, responding to customer inquiries, backorders, and prompt shipping. The order systems are under a severe stress test and seemingly minor system limitations are showing up as major weaknesses. The demand for these goods is unprecedented and overwhelming! Even industry heavyweight Brownells has had to revise their order tracking system in attempt to keep up with the avalanche of orders.
Hopefully, manufacturers are not running their production lines beyond their capabilities too.
Local gun stores here, even large dealers, are placing ads essentially begging to buy guns from the general public. Dealers are trying to stock their shelves for customers, but when those dealers have to buy at inflated street prices, then add their margin, the retail prices have to go up and the cycle repeats. Eventually, supplies will return to normal, prices will come back down, and the industry will make their customer service / ordering systems more robust to handle surges in demand.
Until then, we’ll all need to be patient.
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This is a reprint of Dr. Paul Quinnett’s thoughts on how to effectively deal with the disturbed, before they commit murder, reprinted with his permission. I don’t agree with all of his statements, but he actually is willing to have a conversation that focuses on the real issues we face, rather than just latching onto intentionally deceptive, focus group tested, “Demand a Plan” slogans.
Dr. Quinnett noted in his preface: The shooter in Newtown was suicidal first, homicidal second. This is true of most mass murderers and about 30% of domestic violence related murder-suicides.
To keep the debate from veering off into the size of AR-15 magazines and pumping vast sums of money into broad mental health reform, what we need is a targeted, proven, and effective way to address firearms access by persons suffering from suicidal self-directed violence, a few of whom are also homicidal.
Mass murderers never ask themselves, “And after I kill all these innocent people, how will I escape?”
The “escape” is a pre-planned suicide – whether delivered by one’s own hand or by a police sharpshooter.
Reducing access to firearms will surely save lives, but such measures fail to address the source code in all these terrible tragedies: the disordered brain of an utterly hopeless mentally ill suicidal person whose reasons for releasing hell on others die with him.
The vast majority of the mentally ill are not violent, but those who become suicidal represent a special threat to themselves, and sometimes others. The so-called suicide “contagion effect” travels like a virus from one suicidal mind to another suicidal mind via the media, and most mass murders follow another event previously publicized where a “like me” suicidal, rage-filled young man kills others and then himself.
Yes, our culture of violence aids and abets the suicidal mind. Yes, too many guns and large capacity magazines increase the body count. Yes, the contagion effect is real and media exposure of mass murderers inspires copycats.
But let’s be real, while some measures will help on each of these fronts, these genies are out of the bottle and they are not going back in.
Only by preventing the development of his suicidal desire, ideation, intent, capacity, planning and, yes, frustrating his attempt to acquire the firearms that his rage requires to express itself can we hope to find a compassionate and sustainable solution. Early detection, assessment, and treatment of emergent suicidal behavior in known at-risk populations will at least give us a chance for reducing violence in our nation.
The debate on gun control will produce mostly heat, not light. Gun safety is another matter and excellent light on this subject can be found at www.meansmatter.org – one of Harvard’s wonderful School of Public Health’s web sites. Gun owners who are alert to signs of crisis in a family member and temporarily store guns away from home if a family member is at risk of harming themselves or others will avert some disasters.
To understand the prime source code of violence – the suicidal mind – we must first understand that persistent suicidal thoughts and feelings are markers for unremitting, unendurable psychological pain and suffering. If we are thinking about killing ourselves or others, something is terribly wrong and something needs immediate attention and balm.
Psychological pain is one term that covers distress, despair, depression, rage, anxiety, isolation or hopelessness. More than 90% of suicide deaths are by people suffering from serious mental illnesses or substance abuse problems, the majority of which remain untreated, but all of which can cause what may become unbearable psychological pain.
According to a 2008 federal survey, in one year the adult American psychological pain index was as follows:
- 8.3 million of us seriously considered suicide
- 2.2 million of us made a plan to kill ourselves
- 1 million of us made an actual suicide attempt
For 2010, unbearable psychological pain contributed to 38,364 completed suicides. That’s 105 Americans a day. Imagine what Congress and the President would do if a commercial airplane loaded with 100+ Americans crashed not once a year, not once a month, not once a week, but every single day, day after day after day?
Yet because suicidal people usually die alone and devastate only their family and friends, it is only when suicidal people commit mass murder that Congress rises from its lethargy. But it is not just broad mental health reform; it is bringing a laser focus to the prevention of suicide – the source code to violent injury death.
We who work to prevent suicide for a living strongly support this statement by former Surgeon General of the United States, Dr. David Satcher, “Suicide is our most preventable death.” Rather than arming our teachers, we should ask: What actionable public health knowledge do we have to reduce suicide and, with it, collateral violence toward others?
Unknown to the vast majority of the public, we actually have a lot of actionable knowledge. Published only this past September, the National Strategy for Suicide Prevention 2012 represents our best scientific thinking on how to prevent suicide and its related violence toward others. The plan includes achievable goals, objectives, and action steps.
Will it help?
Yes!
Need proof?
In 2003 our own US Air Force published a multi-year study in the prestigious British Medical Journal clearly demonstrating that a robust, mandatory, suicide prevention/mental health promotion program dramatically reduced violence of all kinds. Findings:
- 33% drop in suicides
- 18% drop in homicides
- 54% drop in serious family violence
- 30% drop in moderate family violence.
- 18% drop in accidental deaths (some of which were likely disguised suicides)
Several large means restriction efforts to prevent suicide have proven successful in other countries, and in the Air Force study reductions in other-directed violence were a happy and unexpected byproduct.
So let’s focus on what will work. Let’s implement our new National Strategy for Suicide Prevention 2012 now.
Implementing the National Strategy will have a wide, generalized harm-reduction effect through the improvement of the mental health of an entire nation. Remember calm, happy, mentally healthy people – including millions of America gun owners – do not kill themselves or others.
So as the gun debate unfolds let’s not get lost in the bushes of how many bullets a Bushmaster holds, but view it through this lens:
- Almost all mass murderers die by suicide.
- Suicide is preventable.
- Prevent suicide and you prevent violence.
An estimated 39,000 Americans will die by suicide in 2013. Among them will be our children, our teenagers, our working brothers and sisters, and hundreds of doctors, police officers, firemen, and veterans. Since each 1% rise in unemployment drives up the suicide rate by 1%, America’s psychological pain index stands at an all time high. Thanks to improved safety engineering and fewer motor vehicle accident fatalities, suicide deaths now exceed those from car crashes.
So, let’s recalibrate and resource safety-focused interventions that will not only lower our nation’s psychological pain index, but lead to broad reductions in self and other-directed violence, including the risk of mass murders.
When our national grief work is done, let us memorialize our collective loss by taking bold, science-based positive actions. We have a plan. America, it is time!
Paul Quinnett, Ph.D. is President and CEO of the QPR Institute, Inc., an educational organization dedicated to the prevention of suicide @ www.qprinstitute.com. He is also Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Washington School of Medicine Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Health. A free e-book on preventing suicide is available from the Institute’s web site.
Hat tip to Deb Ferns at The WOMA, whose thoughts are well-worth reading too.
Paul Quinnett’s Contact information:
Paul Quinnett, Ph.D.
S 14115 Merriney Road
Cheney, WA 99004
509-235-8823
pquinnett@mindspring.com
© Paul Quinnett, Ph.D. 2013
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It’s time for the annual Arizona State Rifle and Pistol Association (ASRPA) dinner on Saturday June 2, 2012. If you haven’t bought your tickets yet, you have until early Wednesday afternoon on May 30th to get your tickets to this very special Arizona Centennial dinner.
You can purchase dinner tickets online at www.ASRPA.com.
Dinner, raffles, speakers, and festivities will be at:
Crowne Plaza Hotel
2532 W. Peoria Ave
Phoenix, AZ 85029
(888) 444-0401
Event Schedule:
5:00pm Social hour
6:00pm Opening Prayer, Pledge, and Introductions
6:10pm Dinner
6:30pm Special Arizona Speakers Jack Harper, Matt Salmon, Sylvia Allen, Col. (ret) Costa Tzavaras
7:15pm High Achievement Awards for ASRPA Junior Shooters.
7:30pm Special Guest Speaker Nick Adams
8:00pm Raffle Ticket Winners
8:15pm Alison’s 27th Annual Auction
9:00pm’ish Adjournment
ASRPA has a great list of speakers lined up, including former Congressional Representative Matt Salmon, Arizona State Senator Sylvia Allen, Arizona Representative Jack Harper, and Col. Costa Tzavaras and a special guest speaker from Sydney, Australia, Nick Adams. The evening’s theme is American Excellence and a celebration of our 100th year of Statehood.
There are also some great raffles where you can win:
The Arizona Rangers Firearms set. An authentic Charcoal Blue and Case colored .45 Colt Peacemaker (Cimarron/Uberti) with 4 3/4″ barrel and holster PLUS the “Gun that Won the West”, the 1873 .45 Colt lever action rifle with 24″ barrel, Charcoal blue and case colored.
The “Tip Top Mine Armored Coach Package. A 12 guage 3inch double trigger, exposed Rabbit Ear Hammers, 20” barrels, canvas sling with shell loops, and canvas duster case.
A special Nick Adams Downunder edition of a Sharps Long Range Rifle.
Support safe recreational and competitive shooting in Arizona. Go to the ASRPA website and get your dinner and raffle tickets right now.
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