That's Jason Vanderbrink who is President of not just Federal but also Speer, CCI, and now the Remington ammunition plant. I suspect the comment about not giving a rat's ass for handloaders is based on his description of the primer problem in the second half of
this video. He never says he doesn't care. He makes the statement the huge demand uptick (described in the first half of the same video) for ammunition is consuming all their primer capacity. He explains the handloading market has always been fed by the excess primer capacity the companies had after its ammunition demand was met, historically.
Vanderbrink also explains that up until March last year, there was plenty of that excess primer capacity. This past year and continuing into this one, primer capacity is being used up because his choice is, run the ammunition facility for all its worth
or let it go idle part of the time to leave primers available for handloaders, while those wanting loaded ammunition would get less. So he has to rob Peter to pay Paul or Paul to pay Peter, and he's chosen to do the one that keeps the most employees working the most hours and that profits the company most. No surprise there; that's his job.
Vanderbrink also explains it takes at least a couple of years to get an additional primer manufacturing facility working. (I know from other reading, the building and environmental permits alone can take over a year to get). Also, as Forbes reported, in the shortage during the first half of the administration before last, the ammunition industry did add capacity. Then, when the last administration arrived and everyone felt their 2nd Amendment rights were safe, people stopped buying, and manufacturers got stuck with a lot of excess capacity that wasn't paying for itself. Forbes says nobody in the industry is looking for a repeat of that.
So no new capacity is planned at this time. This is where I suspect the commenter's conclusion comes from that Vanderbrink doesn't care about handloaders. It is probably why he thinks Vanderbrink wants to create an excess-free business model with no capacity for us. But, again, that's not what Vanderbrink is actually saying. It just is what the situation is right now and he's got to be concerned the rabid demand will back off again at some point and they will once again have all the excess capacity they can handle. I imagine his strategy is to wait to see where the market actually settles out.
