Had a pallet get delayed that isn't going to arrive in time for the March Great Guns show.  Ammo was posted online https://kaleoarms.com/ammunition/

The posts on the general board are correct... manufacturers (including Vista) have been planning for a price increase April 1 due to rising cost of raw materials, labor, shipping etc.  Truth be told, ammo cost/prices have been creeping up over the past year.  Hawaii gets the double whammy of higher product costs and increased shipping due in significant part to the increase in the ocean fuel surcharge. 


9mm Remington UMC 115gr FMJ (500rds) -- $155

9mm Winchester 115gr FMJ (500rds) -- $160

9mm PMC Bronze 147gr FMJ (500rds) -- $175

45acp Magtech 230gr FMJ (250rds) -- $125


223 PMC Bronze 55gr FMJ (500rds) -- $265

556 Magtech 55gr FMJ (500rds) -- $275


22LR CCI SV 40gr LRN (2,500rds) -- $225

22LR Blazer 40gr LRN (2,500rds) -- $265

Hi all!  Ah the joys of shipping to Hawaii, haha.  Thank you all for the kind words, and we are happy to have found another shipping avenue. 

On an unrelated note... our gmail based email is not playing nicely with hawaii.rr.com emails.  I tried to send a couple replies to those emails and they bounced back to us.  I'm still trying to figure out why (I think its a setting on our end).  In the meanwhile, please resend with another email or send PM here.  Sorry!  We're not ignoring you (promise)

Brought in some extra cases of 9mm Fiocchi 115gr FMJ on the last pallet.  $390 and tax 1,000rds. 
Already on island, will ship UPS Tuesday (a second pickup will also be scheduled later in the week/early following week). 

https://www.kaleoarms.com/hawaii-ammunition/order

Monday Edit: 4 cases

I'm pretty sure this ammo was bought from us.  From our end, the history of this ammo was it was purchased from a distributor in early-mid September 2021.  The cases look to have 2021 case date stamps.  We left the cases sealed when we sent them.  I don't know for sure how long that distributor had these cases on hand, but I know they tend to turn inventory fairly quickly so I doubt if it was sitting very long in their inventory.

FWIW, Winchester ammo (well Remington UMC too and others) aren't the prettiest of rounds.  The bulk ammo we've seen since mid-2020 has not been nearly as eye pleasing as years past.  Its almost as if these companies are trying to push through such high volumes that the annealing part has been less eye pleasing as the months go by.  Pre-covid, the annealing we were used to seeing was more uniform and slight in color.  Late 2020 onward has been more "colorful" annealing for lack of a better adjective.  Like the other replies mentioned, its Winchester... but its probably cosmetically different annealing on those rounds.

Can cases of ammo be sent to from the mainland to your home or have to special order it from a vendor like Kaleo?  Cases of ammo are going down in price and I want to order more cases, can ammo be shipped to your door?

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

It doesn’t have to be through us. It is definitely possible, but like the other replies mentioned, it can be expensive and there’s some hurdles to clear.

The first hurdle is going to be finding a retailer who is willing to even ship the ammo to California. California went to an ammo vendor license system a few years ago. Even though the ammo is technically going to a final destination outside California, for the ammo retailer’s purposes, your shipment is delivered to a California address and that’s a no no. Alternative is to ship to Seattle, but there’s not as many freight consolidators.  The second hurdle is going to be finding a freight consolidator that handles ammunition and that you’re willing to pay their prices. Some also tack on a per piece surcharge to receive and consolidate in addition to the actual ocean freight and hazmat. Shipment minimum charges suck too if shipping only a couple cases.  Once it gets to Hawaii, the to your door gets a lot easier.  Most ocean freighters will also offer delivery of some type, but the cost for delivery can often be just as much as the ocean freight was (seriously, so expensive for final delivery) so it’ll be cheaper just to pick it up yourself if you can.

Side note... we checked with UPS hazmat to see if we could ship ammo ground directly from the mainland like Rhugged claimed that they could. UPS hazmat said the rules haven’t changed, and that shipping ammunition ground conus to Hawaii is not allowed. Would’ve been cool for all involved if could, but still no can.


Ammo prices and availability have improved greatly the last month for the bigger retailers (probably the ones who take huge deliveries directly from Vista group etc). Ammo hasn’t come back on the wholesale distribution side to nearly as great an extent, if at all. That’s why we haven’t sent another pallet yet even though availability looks like it’s better elsewhere. We could send retail sourced ammo, but the downside is we don’t have the wholesale price buffer to absorb the expense of shipping so we wouldn’t be able to price competitively (maybe it still would be competitive seeing what some prices are but that’s another blog). As of now, we’re aiming for maybe late August dependent on if the wholesale side comes back. Many wholesaler arms had retail arms (ex: countrywide sports and outdoor unlimited) and their inventory was almost exclusively diverted to their retail side. Can’t really blame them for doing so... more profit for them selling retail and limited inventory industry wide. 

I thought classics were recon exempt.
Yours didn't meet the year qualification?

No I do not meet the year qualification.

I've been wondering about the gun stores too.  The thing is more ammo is being produced and the number of gun stores probably hasn't changed.  So each gun store should be receiving more ammo now on average than in the past.  There are more new gun owners and people panic buying ammo so inventory levels are down.  So either gun stores here are making bank, or the mainland stores are somehow able to buy more ammo than the local dealers here.

Its also that there are stores that are "dealers" like the LGS who purchase ammo through distributors (like say Davidsons, RSR etc) and then there are stores that buy directly from the manufacturers (Vista Outdoors mainly).  With Vista, I forget what the threshold annual sales amount was to apply for an account but memory points to in the millions.  It seems like the Vista direct stores are getting ammo in more frequently, but the middlemen distribution points (Davidsons/RSR types) have been getting very little supply which then results in the LGS not being able to get ammo themselves.  So in a way we (Hawaii) are a little too small of a market, but I think its more so that we don't really have a big chain store that has big inventory pull from Vista Group.

From what we've seen in the midwest, ammo supply has actually significantly improved the last two or so weeks.  556, 762x51, 40sw, and 45acp have all been regularly dropping pallets worth at the big retailer chains.  Mostly Winchester brand, but recently Federal, Speer, and Blazer have been on the shelves also.  The increased supply on the chain store shelves gives some hope that the distributors will begin to get ammo too that the LGS dealers will be able to access.  Part of the reason why we've been holding off pulling together another pallet is because we've been hoping that that supply spigot opens up so prices go back down (and so we don't get stuck with premium priced sourced inventory). 

On the manufacturing ammunition FFL side, the report I saw a couple days ago from a main component distributor was that inventory arrival was actually pretty good the last month.  The vast majority of what they got went to backorders from the summer/fall, but this was the first newsletter in at least 6 months that mentioned that a dent was made in the backorders.  Primers and powders continue to be on backorder with no new backorders being taken yet on most primer types. 

In times of declared national emergency, which seems to be easy for the Swamp to do sometimes, the government can direct all ammunition manufacturers (and firearms makers) to sell what they produce to the government exclusively.  That includes cartridges as well as individual ammo components.

The DoD has its own ammo factory to supply most of the military's needs which doesn't include the huge number of federal organizations that require agents to use firearms: DHS, IRS, ICE, etc.

So, if the gov't really wanted to put a damper on sales of ammo and guns, they could have done it at the beginning of the pandemic.

The more you know ...

Also... a not so fun fact about Hawaii SB523 (and its predecessors) which wants to require ammunition vendor licensing sneaks in there "that all firearms or ammunition in the possession and control of any licensee at any time of national emergency or crisis, as defined in section 134-34, may be seized and held in possession or purchased by or on the order of the governor until such time as the national emergency or crisis has passed, or until such time as the licensee and the government of the United States or the government of the State may agree upon some other disposition of the same."

Sure a year ago we all thought that such a national emergency would be quite rare... but it rings a different tone now.

Do you bring in  powder?

Not quite yet.  Powder is a different hazmat class than ammo so we're checking with the overland and overwater transportation companies to see what would change if we did start bringing powder and primers with the ammo.  Final mile is also a challenge because of the zoning and fire codes and vehicle transportation rules depending on the total weight being transported.  ...Totally unregulated industry though right HI Leg? ...

First off, I’m very sorry you had to deal with the UPS Honolulu Customer Service Center (Extra sorry if you had the misfortune of getting either the female worker or the manager). Let’s just say that center is not very customer service oriented or knowledgeable/correct about shipping regulations (even their own).

From our understanding, UPS will ship ammunition Via Ground Service as ORM-D if it is being shipped within the lower 48 states, intra-Oahu, and intra-Alaska. I believe you can ship ammunition from Hawaii to the mainland, but it has to go hazmat air which is $$$ (tbh it’s $$$$$$$$$) and also has to have the whole hazmat shipper and paperwork that goes along with it. Give the UPS hazardous shipment a call. They’re very helpful and are on the mainland. They would know for sure if/how UPS could ship it.

Your other option would be to ocean freight it to the west coast and then ship it UPS or FedEx from there. East bound freight is usually cheaper than West bound, but the minimum ocean freight cost might get you anyway. We don’t ship Aloha freight, but I know others who had pretty good experiences shipping Ammo in through them a couple years ago.

Starting to see 223 and 22LR come back in stock, but the cases are much higher now. For example, 223 Wolf Gold is about $120 a case increase and Federal AE 22LR is about $40 increase. With these increases, we’re unsure if the cases would still be “reasonably” priced in Hawaii to bring in at this time. The Wolf Gold would be about 42-43cpr range and the 22lr would be in the $27 a brick range. We’re leaning towards no on the 223 wolf gold, but wanted to put it out here to get a better idea (ie: would you still buy at that price if the alternative is nothing else available). It’s a really unfortunate increase but supply/demand we suppose.