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I went up to the local gun show yesterday (Lynden, WA.) and thought I'd share a little.
A small-ish event at the local fairgrounds but the turn-out was pretty good, not horribly crowded but full. I did three laps around the place looking for something different on each pass.
First pass was spent looking at lever action .30-30's. Prices were interesting- used Win 94's were available for $300-2100. The best deal I saw was a pre-64 (1957) in decent condition for $375, with several post-64 models for $300-400. New Marlin 336's and Rossi's were available for $500-650 and special edition or rare Winchester models were $650- and up from there.
Second lap I was looking for used S&W .38's or .357's. Availability was poor, there weren't many out there, and the ones there were WAY overpriced. Victory models, Model 10's, etc. with marginal blueing that should have been $200-300 had price tags of $450-650. The least expensive .357 I found was a used S/S Taurus, the guy wanted $550 !!!
Last pass was to look at the new 'survival' booths. Two different LTS food vendors, Wise and Thrive dealers, were set up and both were pushing 'kits' like 6 months or a years worth of food prepackaged, that sort of thing. The Wise foods guy was also selling a variety of Aqua-Mira water filtering and purification products and was pretty knowledgeable on the subject (pretty rare in my experience). He also had Berkey's onsite and available, Royal Berkey's for $280. The Thrive foods guy was knowledgeable on the subject of LTS food, much more so than any of the other food vendors I've talked to, we discussed the pros and cons of several types of products, their manufacturers and their availability; he knew his stuff.
Generally the show was disappointing, prices were, on average, ridiculously high and selection was so-so. It was still worth the hour long drive but just barely. I scored a couple of rolls of trip/snare wire, a new knife, and some reloading dies.
A small-ish event at the local fairgrounds but the turn-out was pretty good, not horribly crowded but full. I did three laps around the place looking for something different on each pass.
First pass was spent looking at lever action .30-30's. Prices were interesting- used Win 94's were available for $300-2100. The best deal I saw was a pre-64 (1957) in decent condition for $375, with several post-64 models for $300-400. New Marlin 336's and Rossi's were available for $500-650 and special edition or rare Winchester models were $650- and up from there.
Second lap I was looking for used S&W .38's or .357's. Availability was poor, there weren't many out there, and the ones there were WAY overpriced. Victory models, Model 10's, etc. with marginal blueing that should have been $200-300 had price tags of $450-650. The least expensive .357 I found was a used S/S Taurus, the guy wanted $550 !!!
Last pass was to look at the new 'survival' booths. Two different LTS food vendors, Wise and Thrive dealers, were set up and both were pushing 'kits' like 6 months or a years worth of food prepackaged, that sort of thing. The Wise foods guy was also selling a variety of Aqua-Mira water filtering and purification products and was pretty knowledgeable on the subject (pretty rare in my experience). He also had Berkey's onsite and available, Royal Berkey's for $280. The Thrive foods guy was knowledgeable on the subject of LTS food, much more so than any of the other food vendors I've talked to, we discussed the pros and cons of several types of products, their manufacturers and their availability; he knew his stuff.
Generally the show was disappointing, prices were, on average, ridiculously high and selection was so-so. It was still worth the hour long drive but just barely. I scored a couple of rolls of trip/snare wire, a new knife, and some reloading dies.
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