I'm not sure who  receives the Buds Gun Shop emails, but Buds has either created or formed a partnership with a website known as Bidgunner. Bidgunner is a penny auction site in the same style as many of the other recently opened penny auction websites (see quibids, etc). For those that don't know what a penny auction website is think of ebay where you bid on what you want, however, the company itself is who is placing the item for up for auction, not a third party person or business. The auctions may only be raised by set amounts (often $0.01, hence penny auction) and in order to bid you must purchase a "bid pack" from the website. These bid packs come in various sizes and prices and the more bids you purchase in bulk the lower your cost per bid. If you win the auction you are bidding on you pay the final price of the item plus shipping in addition to any money you spent for all of the bids you placed.

There is generally a large chatter about these websites since they have opened about if they are a scam or not. I can't speak for the internal workings of practices of the websites (paying particular attention to bidgunner) but I wanted to take some time to give everyone an idea of why these sites operate and exist so you can determine if it's something you even want to mess with. I'm not trying to state the obvious or act as though I have some overarching knowledge to hand down to the masses, just that I have done personal research on these websites and have made a few revelations that may not generally be extremely obvious.

All of that being said, let us consider that Bidgunner currently offers bid packs in the following sizes:

500 bids - $325 - $0.65/bid
200 bids - $140 - $0.70/bid
100 bids - $80 - $0.80/bid
50 bids -  $45 - $0.90/bid
30 bids - $27 - $0.90/bid

Now, the website has more or less just started and I assume most people will be unfamiliar with this type of website unless they've participated in other penny auction sites. As such, we will assume that the average Bidgunner user will likely purchase the smaller bid packs to get their feet wet and play around with the penny auction format.

The next step is to pick an item up for auction currently. There is a standard Ruger LCP being auctioned. Ruger lists the LCP at an MSRP of $379 and Buds has it listed for $299. I am not familiar with the pricing schemes that gun shops operate under but for this example let's assume Buds is trying to make a 15% profit margin on the gun and has marked it up accordingly. This would mean they purchased the gun for a price of about $260.

At the time of this writing the Ruger LCP is going for $5.91 with $0.01 minimum bids and has six days left until the auction will end. Before we go any further let's analyze what that current price means for Bidgunner. $5.91 translates into 591 penny bids. Assuming all bids were placed from bid packs in the lowest two tiers that becomes 591 x $0.90 = $531.90 which has been more or less "given" to Bidgunner in the cost of bids alone. Next, remember that Bidgunner/Buds likely obtained the LCP for $260. In other words, before the auction has even finished, Bidgunner has made $531.90 - $260 = $271.90 in the price of bids alone. Or look at it this way, Bidgunner has "sold" an LCP for $531.90.

However, the LCP still has six days left to auction. Just picking a random price we'll assume it will end for a price of $20. If all of the bids were placed from bid packs in the lowest tier as we have already been operating under then the $20 becomes 2000 penny bids which becomes 2000 x $0.90 = $1,800. Take the price of the gun from that and Bidgunner has just made $1,540 on the sale of one gun (excluding the additional money that will be paid by the winner for the gun itself).

So, Bidgunner is making lucrative profits on the sale of one gun, but is there a deal to be had for the average Joe? Of course, if you spend your bids wisely and have self control and a lot of luck. Let's say you purchase an initial 30 bids and use all bids to win that LCP for $20. You spent $27 on bids plus the $20 for the gun and $10 shipping. $57 for an LCP (excluding your own FFL's transfer fee) is a pretty smoking deal no matter who you are. Consider, however, that you don't win the LCP and you spent all 30 of your bids, you're now out $27 with nothing to show for it other than the chance to purchase the LCP at MSRP. Woohoo!

To summarize, I'm not commenting on whether or not you can score deals on some awesome gear and guns, you most certainly can (albeit it amounts to gambling on if you will win or not). Instead, I'd rather anyone who took the time to read this remember that sites like this are profiting off of the masses (not necessarily any single person) and as a collective we would be paying upwards of 500% over retail for some items. As such, I leave it for you to decide if you think it's a "scam" or not and if you want to be a part of filling a company's bank account like it is going out of style.

I'll pass on the whole mess.

Fuck that noise.  I will just shop around, thank you...

PT Barnum would have been running penny bid auction sites if they were around back then.

scam for the stupid.

 That is the truth. I got an email this morning from Bud's announcing the new auction site, was not impressed. Then again it is the American way to get rich by separating a fool and his money.



 

That's like driving 20 miles to save a penny on gas.
 

I also got this e-mail and the 1st thing that came to mind was no way will I get involved in this and for sure not where I would spend my money.

I am sure there are things to consider such as if the item is damaged for example

Seeing that email has me considering to no longer purchase anything from BUDS again, it's not technically a scam, but close enough where I don't want to be involved with people that do it.

I just received the email from Buds, did a search, and found this thread.  Thanks for this informative summary, tac hooligan.
The way I see it, the ethical conduct and underlying motives of a business should always be a consideration to where you spend your money.  (That's why I avoid purchasing anything made in China, but that discussion is worthy of a separate thread.)  That being said, I have always been suspicious of Buds since my experience and research have shown that Buds has always leaned toward the shady side of ethical business conduct.  Bidgunner has tipped the scale.  This is exactly what I needed to finally renounce Buds.

I doubt these penny bid sites are going to get the traffic they want.  
 

He didn't place all of those bids.  If each bid cost $1 and he bid 10 times he got that for $141.64.  





That said, I don't think I'll pay for chances to win.



 

He placed all those bids................

Wow.  That's either some serious stupid or a shill.
 

I got  the email today.

Sounded like a raffle/scam to me––and way too complex to deal with.

So I did a search here and this great thread explaines what I intuitively knew.

Thanks for the explanation.

Holy Hell....

 

No it's not. the winner paid $829.93 for the bids plus $121.64 for the gun, plus $10 shipping, in total the winner paid over $960 for that gun.





 

Doh! You are correct, Sir.  I guess that is how they lure in so many suckers, on the face of it it looks like a bargain, until you actually stop, think, and do the math.

 

If you think that's bad, if the buyer were in CA he would have to pay sales tax on the total amount received by BidGunner, not on the amount he paid for the gun.

Scroll down to post #5

It's only a bad deal if you bid like a fucktard like that guy.  Anyone smart would track similar items for a bit and see what the usual ending price is and not even start bidding until it got close.  He wasted over 1000 bids on something he could have probably only used 100-200 on if he really wanted it and less than 100 if he was smart about it and had the time.  I'd never get involved with this shit in the first place, but if you're not retarded you could make out pretty well.