Price of Lead

[Sushihunter]

Here is a link that downrigger fishermen might find interesting:

http://www.infomine.com/Investment/HistoricalCharts/ShowCharts.asp?c=Lead

I tried to link the graph here, but it kept loading a graph for gold, not lead - I'm not sure if there is a deeper meaning in that or not...

The good news is that it looks like the price of lead has peaked and is now dropping a bit.

 

[Rum Buddies]

sure looks like a downward trend doesn't it, I hope so!

I saw cannon balls for $69 at crappy tire, thats crazy.

 

[rln]

when considering the price of lead at stores, think of the cost of shipping it there from either a wholesale or manufacturing location. Think of the cost of having some one pour a 10lb ball in Vancouver and the cost to ship it to Campbell river or how a bout Prince George. Lead may sell for $1.50 a pound in it's raw state, now pay the labour cost to pour a cannon ball and you need to think of the volume of cannon balls that can be poured in an hour. In today's world of very high fuel costs at both the making and shipping part of things, it's surprising that the cannon balls don't cost even more.

 

[adrianna3]

Yes, there are a lot of factors that reflect the price of a finnished cannonball. The price of the raw lead, the fact that I have to pay both taxes on it from the scrap dealer, my time and fuel to get it, wire for the loops and eyes, fuel to melt it, time to clean up all the mould and seam lines, not to mention respirator and cartriges to hopefully protect my health. Then most of the time I have to deliver the balls to whoever wants them. Most of all it's the time. You have to figure out what that's worth to yourself.

I think that sports stores have to pay a lot for shipping the product to their store and then they apply the standard retail markup, usually around a 100% I believe on fishing gear.

 

[Sushihunter]

Oh, I don't doubt that there are many factors that are pushing up the price of lead downrigger balls, but the main thins are cost of raw material (lead), and the cost of fuel, which is driving up the cost of shipping to the retail outlet.

The other costs mentioned, time, labour to produce them has not gone up any in the last two years, which is the time this big jump in price has occurred.

Places like Canadian Tire, Wal-Mart, Zellers, and the like are not buying from some home brewer of molten metals. They could not produce enough to supply the market. And they can not control their costs in these small batches. They do not have the buying power that a full sized manufacturer has.

When Wal-Mart says they will buy your product, but only if you reduce the price by 50 cents a unit, they generally get it as they will buy a million of them. The back yard ball builder does not have that kind of clout when buying lead ingots to make his product, and will have a higher cost per unit than say Delta Tackle who may be pouring 500 balls a day.

However, the home builders do a good job at undercutting the retail sellers of lead balls, because they do not need the same mark-up to make a buck, and many of them do it to save a buck on their own use.

 

[rln]

quote:Originally posted by adrianna3


I think that sports stores have to pay a lot for shipping the product to their store and then they apply the standard retail markup, usually around a 100% I believe on fishing gear.

lucky if the mark up is a 40% gross margin overall on a product like lead.

 

[Last Chance]

I'm still going through my stash of $0.40 per pound lead. Gonna hurt the next spring to pour.