I'm a fairly new licensee and have been dealing with Palmetto State Armory. They usually give me $30-$50 off of their firearms, but working with them is a headache. By the time my representative gets back to me, the items are sold out a good bit of the time...…
Are there any other vendors who do decent deals for FFL's and are good to work with? I'm actually more interested into building AR platform rifles, so any parts vendors would be useful as well.

My dealer uses RSR for somethings, Zanders Sporting Goods for other things - at least those are the 2 i've seen on items I have purchased from my dealer that had their labels on the shipping box.
Hope that helps.

Do you have a storefront or are you home based? This will be a deciding factor on who is best for you. RSR for example will not allow home based now, along with a few others. I have other issues with distributors not wanting to deal with CA.

I can usually find what I need between my short list of distributors, Ive also registered as a direct dealer with some other companies. Then there are some that won't deal unless you "buy" into a tiered program or stock. My issue with stocking comes down to stocking stuff that I won't be able to move OR is banned by CA OR can be banned in a heartbeat.

I'm home based and use Lipsey's & Davidson's for guns and I seem to do the best on Ammo from Chattanooga. Lipsey's has good shipping rates and they discount it if you let them send on a Friday. Davidsons just dropped their ammo charge($9.99) if you order over $500 in ammo.

I really like Zander's but they have "suspended" business to CA because of Prop. 65, I'm told they will at some point resume but it been 5 1/2 months. Zander's website has something to be desired, it's pretty slow. On the other hand they are really good with their shipping rates and have a good variety.

What kind of pricing can I expect from Zanders or Lipsey?

I would not use anyone who does not allow online ordering. Talking to humans to place an order is so 20th century. I use RSR, SilencerShop.

Lipseys is lower than Davidsons a majority of the time and they have better shipping rates if you let them ship on a Friday. Davidsons is the same or lower on some Items.
I was looking for a Browning shotgun the other day and Davidson's was $120 more then Lipsey's, and Davidson's would have charged for shipping.

I think Zander's has theist pricing along with the best shipping policies, and as I said before they also seem to have the best variety. If I could just gt them t ship to CA again. Lipsey's only sells guns and Class 3, No ammo. Davidson's Zander's and Chattanooga all have ammo.

I would if I were you get as many accounts as you can, that way you can find out who and what works best for you. I also like being able to go to "the other guys" if someone is out of stock or the price is high(like Davidson's in some cases). Your going to find that the margins are going to be real tight if you want to be competitive. My wife works in interior design and the mark up is between 100-300% across the board. You're going to find the gun business is 10-15% if you're lucky.

I like buying from mge quite a bit and also rsr and Davidson’s.

The problem with small dealers whether home based or not.  Is that unless you establish a business credit account with 10 or 30 day charge cycles and can pay with a check whether e-check or snail mail you have going to be adding 3% CC fees to you costs.  At a min a person should get set up to use E-Check.

The margin is thin as it is.  And, ammo is heavy and can only be shipped UPS, Fedex, come on company truck, or local common carrier.

Many OEM's three levels of pricing.  Which may or may not allow for the best pricing?

So many wanna dealers fail miserably at thinking they can keep up with big box stores and such.  The money is in used guns...... not new.

Nailed it. I make a majority of my money on estate and inherited collections.

I didn't have any issues getting terms with any of the distributors I use. And I usually pay it off ASAP. With Lipsey's I use E-check but they offered me terms and I didn't need it. I won't use the credit card because of the extra % they charge and it kills my profit. I have a personal line of credit I can use if I need a temporary influx of cash, but I reserve it for purchasing a large collection if I have allot of money out or it's tied up somewhere else. Then I move the best guns of that group as fast as I can to zero out the credit line.

You have to have something that makes you more desirable than the big guys. Your knowledge, convenience, ability to save them time, ect. I can get a guy in/out in 30 min, and with all the CA paperwork/hoops thats not bad. I do appointment only and I have everything set up when they show up. Most guys biggest complaints about the big dealers comes down to a few things I hear all the time. The counter guys are rubes, the amount of time it takes to get in/out, the sales pitch and that it takes the same amount of time when they pick up after the waiting period. I have the pick up down to less then 10 min.

I can afford to sell the guns and ammo at a competitive price because I have very little overhead and don't require a sale to live. Dealing is a side job and anything I make goes right back into it for right now. As said above it's all about used guns. New gun sales cover operating costs like licensing.

You can't beat the big dealers, they will crush you on margins. I am competitive with ammo but thats because I order enough to get free shipping($500-700). Also the New California Law's regarding ammo have made it somewhat better for dealers, in that folks have to have the ammo shipped to a dealer and the dealer can charge to receive it. We are also required to collect sales tax for it, thats right I have to charge sales tax for something I didn't sell. Same for guns.(try figuring out how to that in quickbooks). It's a shit show. So, it's either the same price or cheaper to order from me. The calibers you're going to have a hard time matching/beating are going to be the popular calibers(9mm,.223/5.56).

Most of my stuff is ordered electronically, but I also have one rep from Zanders who I am constantly in contact with. My Jerrys rep, less so. The others, rarely hear from anyone from their companies
It's still good to have a go-to sales rep to go to with issues and questions.....

One reason why I almost always order from the vendors who offer free shipping, and rarely from the ones that wont set up a 30 day net account or e-check account for me.
Might take an extra day for the order to get to me, but I've found that most customers don't mind the extra day if it saves them $15-20 in shipping costs

We were recently contacted by a rep with 2nd Amendment Wholesale, she offered us JT pinned guns. Try them, we aren't a brick and mortar. I can give your email or number to her if you want. We bought two FA CA7 rifles from her.

The FLY IN THE OINTMENT WITH THE ABOVE STATEMENT is that you can not buy allocated or hard to get guns on line.  You have to talk with your salesman.

Things that come into play....

#1 Volume talks....
#2 Consistently using the vendor
#3 There are never going to be deals with some lines IE glocks.
#4 Kimber and Sig Pricing is best when dealing direc

Sigh.

The statement implied all things equal, I go with the shop that does on-line ordering. I am not talking to a human to order a Glock 17. It did NOT mean that I never, ever talk to someone if that is the only option. Jeez.

+1

The Dealer I associate with has a Store front and has been in Business 35 years.
For decades and thru today they used Jerry's Sports Center now they rolled up with Elliott Bros. under the "United Sporting" banner. They charge $14.95 plus a $2.00 Fuel Charge irrespective of how many packages they ship or from which warehouses.
We buy from most of the big names, here of late Sports South has been supplying quite a bit of inventory, and Graf & Sons is very good for reloading supplies.
With hard to find/get items, its a good idea to have a dedicated salesperson with whoever you're buying from: when there have been droughts, he'd call with his allocation as soon as he was notified it was in stock, down side of that is when they're trying to move crap out and want you to put it in stock.
The money IS in used guns, but avoid the crap and craptascular stuff; it'll only give you grief.

this is true. All of it.
I used to use Jerrys almost exclusively, thinking that getting stuff overnight from their PA warehouse despite the shipping costs was a desirable thing for my customers.
Last year I decided that the extra day it costs to order through Zanders with free shipping made the extra delivery day worthwhile.
My regulars appreciate the lower final cost to them more than the speedy delivery.

Shop I associate with was both receiving for customers as well as placing orders with PSA then "suddenly" it went to shit and they wouldn't do anything with us; I'm not sure if it was because we're in NY, or what, but they were always paid in advance, and we certainly have all the licenses, tax ID, etc.  THEN we got in touch with a representative, and it took several tries, but we set up a Dealer Account which was more than just having a FFL on file, now its no problem at all.  

JSC was my first wholesaler and 98% of the time they were the go-to, but in the last few years they just didn't have product, and they stopped running the Truck up through, and with Forest City closing down making a dash down & back isn't practical...
With this new Shop, we've set up accounts at Zanders and Sports South as they seem to have product in stock, but I doubt they'll be able to have an order placed today here tomorrow by UPS Ground...that "next day" and flat-rate is a real help with multiple packages and different locations.