new FFL need advice.

[kemasa]

I can hear it now, "good place when they first opened, then they raised their prices and blah blah blah...." Just pick a price you think is fair and go with it. Good luck.

Yep. I can't pick a price that I think is fair because other charge less, so I wouldn't get any business.

[DieuSoldat]

PPT are all $35 at big names like BassPro, Turner's, and RifleGear in my area, so I match that. I let friends and family pay at-cost.

I've never seen someone charge $100+. That's quite astonishing.

[acespawnshop]

PPT are all $35 at big names like BassPro, Turner's, and RifleGear in my area, so I match that. I let friends and family pay at-cost.

I've never seen someone charge $100+. That's quite astonishing.

1. PPT fees are set by law

2. They charge 100+ because they don't want to deal with it and your order.

[kemasa]

...
2. They charge 100+ because they don't want to deal with it and your order.

I disagree. If everyone around you charged over $100, would you charge $30? They set it at that because they can and would rather get more money than less. If you consider all of the time and effort to deal with everything, that really isn't a bad price to get to do the transfer. In the lower range, due to others having lower rates, makes it not always be over minimum wage.

The place that had a rate of $200, now they didn't want to deal with it and didn't want to be honest and just say that they don't do transfers.

[acespawnshop]

Ok you might be on to something there Kem with being able to charge that amount for it. There's an awful lot of first time buyers whose only experience was going to the big box retail shop to buy their gun, so naturally when they go to order online they select the big box retailer because that's where they've "always gone" I can see it, and I can see why they are like hey $100 a piece pay it or leave it and I'll bet a lot of them pay it.

[taperxz]

PPT are all $35 at big names like BassPro, Turner's, and RifleGear in my area, so I match that. I let friends and family pay at-cost.

I've never seen someone charge $100+. That's quite astonishing.

Huh?

[taperxz]

1. PPT fees are set by law

2. They charge 100+ because they don't want to deal with it and your order.

$100 is common place where I am. Many charge more

[TKM]

PPT charges are set at $35.

Receiving a firearm has no set fee.

'Tis a subtle but distinct difference.

[Nardo1895]

I'm home based and don't relay on anything for profit however I don't want to do this for free

I too am home based. I would be concerned about retaining my license if I wasn't making any profit. I know ATF requires this be a business which in my mind means making a profit, at least eventually. I don't know if or how ATF judges this, but I try pretty hard to make a profit to prove its a business while still keeping my prices competitive.

Likewise, I have always heard IRS will only allow a business to continue without a profit for "x" years. Otherwise they think you're doing it as a write off or as a hobby.

Maybe I'm wrong in all this. I'm going on four years. I took a loss in year one due to high startup costs, and made a small profit (after expenses) in years 2 and 3. I hope to increase that over time through increased volume. Making a profit is no small feat and hats off to you guys who have been in the biz for a long time. As the old saying goes "If someone gave me a million dollars I'd keep selling firearms 'till it was all gone."

Are my concerns about the need to make a profit unfounded?

[ugimports]

I too am home based. I would be concerned about retaining my license if I wasn't making any profit. I know ATF requires this be a business which in my mind means making a profit, at least eventually. I don't know if or how ATF judges this, but I try pretty hard to make a profit to prove its a business while still keeping my prices competitive.

Likewise, I have always heard IRS will only allow a business to continue without a profit for "x" years. Otherwise they think you're doing it as a write off or as a hobby.

Maybe I'm wrong in all this. I'm going on four years. I took a loss in year one due to high startup costs, and made a small profit (after expenses) in years 2 and 3. I hope to increase that over time through increased volume. Making a profit is no small feat and hats off to you guys who have been in the biz for a long time. As the old saying goes "If someone gave me a million dollars I'd keep selling firearms 'till it was all gone."

Are my concerns about the need to make a profit unfounded?

yes...atf cares that you are in the business...atf doesn't care if you run a successful business

If your A&D log only showed dispositions to you they'd yank the license because you are only using it to enhance your collection.

As long as you have outbound stuff to other people they could care less if you're making -$1000 or +$1M.

It's all about the A&D log not what your taxes or P&L are from the ATF perspective.

IRS/DOJ totally different and can't really opine on them.

I do this as a business and over the past 10 years have had loss years and plus years. Last 2 years were plus years. 2016 was a loss year. All depends what's going on and what my expenses are, etc...

I don't do this as my sole business though. I have a day job. I'd be much more concerned about the P&L always being P if I had to rely on this to eat. Right now the business I only rely on for my pew pew to get fed.. not my belly..

[weaselfire]

I'm in Florida but also a home-based FFL. Since I'm a gunsmith, I do basically no retail sales. But I do cheap transfers. It brings in other business. If I wasn't looking for the business, I might avoid doing transfers entirely. Not really worth the money for transfers alone.

Jeff

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[boobytrap]

The whole point of the transfer is because an individual found a wonder gun on a site usually a good price below retail. Since OP isn’t to worried about profit, how about price matching or beating the online price.

Since the customer is having to pay transfer fee, tax, and DROS anyways he’s calling you to see what his OTD price is going to be. Obviously the customer doesn’t want to pay anything they don’t have to but if you can live with making a few dollars per gun but sell volume you’ll do just as well as the guy Overcharging selling one or two.

As a small business owner you need to formulate 2 numbers, 1st is profit margin %, 2nd is profit margin $. Both numbers are very different, at the end of the day you need to make money, just don’t make it all off one customer.

[acespawnshop]

Price match is hard if say the customer wants to order something that the home based FFL cant get their hands on. Also I've had plenty of customers order online and after shipping and interstate fee pay more than I'm selling the same gun for. I've had customers pay $475 for a new Glock that I have out for $499 and after they pay shipping and my $25 IST fee they are easily $20 over what I'm charging, but they do it all the time.

[kemasa]

Who said that the OP isn't worried about profit? He is asking about transfer fees because he sees the different amounts in different areas.

Who wants to work for a few dollars? The work involved, as well as the risk of doing business makes it not worth it to do if there isn't compensation.

Again, he is asking about transfer fees, not selling firearms.

[ugimports]

Who said that the OP isn't worried about profit? He is asking about transfer fees because he sees the different amounts in different areas.







Who wants to work for a few dollars? The work involved, as well as the risk of doing business makes it not worth it to do if there isn't compensation.



Again, he is asking about transfer fees, not selling firearms.

The OP said he is not worried about profit. Look at what I quoted above.

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