What happened to Ranch Dog Moulds?

[windrider919]

what has happened to Ranch Dog Moulds? I took a friend to the site to show him that he needed to buy a RD .357 mould and it appears to be closing down, selling the leftover moulds. A brief explanation on bottom that if want more moulds contact Lee and the date all sales end. Is He OK? Is Lee going to continue to produce? Or can one of us take over the business. These were really an excellent design and mine in 45 cal is great!

I had heard that he was exp with a .224 bullet and I had already budgeted for the buy.

[DLCTEX]

I think Michael retired and possibly the wait for Lee to manufacture molds may have been a factor. Lee is supposed to offer his designs. I think he is going to continue work on the designs for the other calibers. It may take a while, as custom orders from Lee has a long wait time.

[Jim]

Well, that stinks! I think ol' Richard needs to tighten up a little bit.

[jdgabbard]

He is shutting down. I think there are several reason. But I was lucky enough to get one of those 357 molds on a good deal before he shut down. Good luck with Lee offering them. I don't know how well that will work out.

[Leftoverdj]

Lee custom orders are said to be running a year and up. There are also even more quality issues than there used to be when you do get your order. There may be more issues as well, but those two alone are enough to sink a small business. You simply cannot have your money tied up for a year waiting for product, carry enough inventory to go a year between supplies, and not be able to count on getting salable product.

I can't even blame Lee. They don't control the demand, and they can't just run an ad in the paper and hire someone for the night shift. Making custom moulds takes experience, years of it.

[Wayne Smith]

I guess maybe I assumed that when Lee took over the designs they would be catalog items, not special orders. I hope my assumption is correct, but I have no knowledge that it is.

[Buckshot]

............From what I read on his website he was no longer able to spend any time casting, reloading, experimenting and shooting. Also as Leftoverdj mentioned, it's moulds. Lee is taking a long time and added to that, AFTER the wait there have been quality issues. While Mike didn't make the things he was selling how could you NOT feel bad about customers waiting, waiting, and more waiting and then have it finally come in and be wrong? It's a bad feeling having people count on you and then that happens. Even though you don't control it, it will surely beat you down, especially if you're all about customer service, and I'm sure RD was.

.................Buckshot