Ammo versus...ammo?

[FrankenHollow]

I would find it hard to believe that Winchester or Wally-World would set themselves up for a mega-lawsuit by selling inferior Ammo. If even the ammo was perfectly safe, but under powered or unreliable primers...etc, compared to the same ammo going to "Joe Dokes Sporting Emporium. A case could be made that if an accident of any kind happened using WWWB, they would be screwed because of they Knowingly colluded to sell an inferior product.

I think this is a rumor that the little guys are throwing out their. I feel for them because Wally-World does take a lot of business from them because of Price Only.

No. No. No. You're looking at it all wrong.

They aren't selling "inferior" ammo, they're selling "standard" ammo. It's just that the rest of it is "superior".

I've dealt with Winchester, Remington, Hornady, and ATK (CCI/Federal) sales reps directly. There are different grades of ammo available under the same product labels.
Not every company does it. And not every product can be "spec'd down". ...But it's out there.

[quychang]

My understanding is that Wally World basically puts out a request for quote on X quantity of an item. Then choose the low bidder. Because of their buying power companies are willing to cut corners to get in to the market. In some commodities it's even worse, they basically say "If you want to sell to us, here's what we will pay. " And if no one meets their price, they don't carry the item. I've bought name brand organic vegetables from Costco, and from Walmart. The packaging is identical except for the weight, the Costco bags are bigger. The quality of the produce is NOT the same.

I have no reason to believe they don't use the same strong armed tactics in purchasing ammo.

Mel

[FlyfishermanMike]

I was told that the federal champion brass with the stars on the outside of the FC (* FC *) came from a factory that provided ammo mainly for Wal-Mart. That doesn't mean it isn't safe. It's worked fine for me and reloads just as well as the FC stuff.

[FrankenHollow]

I was told that the federal champion brass with the stars on the outside of the FC (* FC *) came from a factory that provided ammo mainly for Wal-Mart. That doesn't mean it isn't safe. It's worked fine for me and reloads just as well as the FC stuff.

I call that stuff something along the lines of "dot-FC-dot", or "FC-dot".
It appears most often as: ●FC● or ●Federal● (dot before and after) or FC● (dot only after).

Referring to semi-auto handgun cartridge brass (.380 Auto, 9mm Luger, .40 S&W, etc)...
There are two primary handgun cartridge case production facilities for ATK (umbrella corp of Speer, Federal, CCI, RCBS, etc).
There's one in Minnesota that draws their cases. They generally only produce Federal-, FC-, or Speer-stamped cases.
The other facility is in Lewiston Idaho. They produce both drawn and extruded cases, with every possible head stamp in the ATK 'family'.

Extruded cases are not as consistent or as tough as drawn cases. If the casing in question is available as both a drawn and an extruded product, then the extruded version will be "dot" (●) brass. If it is only available as an extruded product, then no dot will be present (such as with CCI and Blazer brass).
In addition, extruded cases have different case capacity than the otherwise identical drawn cases. I don't recall which has the higher case capacity, but my notes say that the difference is 7% (volume).

There are also different versions of cases, that can be identified by other means.
All ATK brass with a cannelure in the case, where the base of the bullet would be, is either +P or +P+ brass. It is drawn with a different alloy than standard brass, and has lower case capacity (due to thicker walls and web). Even if the brass was from standard ammunition (not +P/+P+), or isn't marked "+P" or "+P+", the casings themselves were manufactured as +P/+P+ cases. They should be separated from mixed brass, and loaded separately.
There are also different types of nickel-plated brass. Nickel plated cases can be extruded or drawn, and can have any one of four different types of plating on them. Generally, the extruded brass will have the plating flake off about 30%-50% earlier than drawn brass. Speer's "low luster" nickel-plating has the best wear resistance and rarely flakes off before total case failure. It will wear off, but rarely flakes off.