Hello All,
Went to the 'High Caliber' promoted gun show in Houston's suburb of Pasadena yesterday and wanted to post up some observations. Raised their entry price to $10, but still offer a dollar off for vets/military/LEO.
Pretty much all firearms are available here in Texas. Plenty of AKs, ARs, Pistol Caliber Carbines and handguns if you are willing to pay a premium over prices before the craziness started. I did notice with the availability, prices have come down a bit from highs during the summer and fall.
Looked for a Sig P365 XL for a friend, found a couple for $699.99. That is about $70 over what Academy has them for.
Ammo is still stupid expensive. We have entered a bizarre new world where I could have purchased 10mm cheaper than 9mm.
9mm range ammo is basically $1 a round, $2+ for any kind of defensive ammo, and people are buying it.
.300BLK - $2 each.
5.56mm - 1$+ each. (bit less if you wanted 500+ rounds of steel case imported)
At least 7.62x39 is still under a buck a round.
Some gougers were even trying to sell shotgun hunting ammo at overly inflated prices, you can still find it at regular prices at Walmart and Academy here.
100 round boxes of CCI .22lr Minimags were all over the show at $30 each box.
Saw a lot of, for me, never before seen brands of .22lr ammo going for a lot more than I'm willing to pay. $10 for 50 was not uncommon.
The sellers have seemed to have emptied their bottom drawers and put out any ammo they can find. Number of folks selling little baggies of a few rounds of this and that. Did see one full clip of Carcano rifle ammo (6) on a table for $25, thought wow, really!?
Three different tables had inexpensive Damascus steel knives for cheap (from India I think). Nowhere near the steel quality most want, but nice looking fit and finish and well under $100 a knife. The two guys working the knife sharpening table had close to an hours worth of work ahead of them before they could get to the next customers knife. They do a good job, so it's worth the wait.
TShirt and jerky vendors there as usual.
'Solvent trap' guy had a crowd at his table. I did notice he is selling a very specific drilling jig for those that may need an extra hole in their lower receiver.
Few tables loaded with cheap flashlights/lasers. Number of others had the cheap automatic OTF knives and brass knuckles. (knuckles are illegal to carry here, but not to possess.)
Found and bought a pair of used, aftermarket magazines for a S&W 6946, over paid at $50 each. It gets a family member 3 total now, hope he will quit bitching now about not having enough.
Did get a deal on some used, but good condition bi-pods with tilt mounts. $40 for the pair.
Missed on a pistol deal. Talking to a dealer I know and a guy approached him with a Tokorov TT handgun converted to 9mm. Wanted $180 for it, dealer offered him less and before I could break away and get to him, guy across the aisle bought it. It looked in good shape. Later went by the table and asked what he was going to ask for that $180 handgun (think I pissed him off) he said at least $350. That is what they are going for online.
With this seeming to be the time to sell underutilized firearms for good prices, I may take a buddy up on his offer to let me put a few things on his table at the Greater Houston Gun Collectors show in Humble (another suburb of Houston) next weekend. That used to be the biggest show by far 2-3 times a year here. Now it's just a shadow of it's past. The PC democrats that run Houston have forced them out of their normal venue at the NRG convention center. They were basically in the same location for 50+ years.
However it's on a side of town that does not see a lot of shows so it might be pretty good.
