Hi PCP, yes, it's hard now to find much under 5.50 (that is really any good other than as you said,,,,,to go bang, (I was just at Academy on Sunday looking over their shot shell menu, and it was looking a little thin, but I did notice the pricing, never know, things keep going up in price and you will be able to start loading whatever you want for cheaper than you can buy.) I guess the upside to reloading that many who do not do it fail to take into account is that if you take your time on a few weekends and load a few different shells with a combination of hulls, powder, wads and shot, you can usually put together a very good load that will put most anything that the factory makes available look like a promo shell performance wise. What I mean is, depending if I'm using a federal paper or federal plastic, or a Winchester AA hull, with the correct wad I can put together a 1 oz or 1-1/4 oz that will pattern so well nothing shot at with any accuracy will survive. I have put some loads together over the years that after a couple of weekends the thirty inch pattern was just amazing, better than anything that was store bought at twice the price, and that is the key, YOU CAN MAKE THE LOADS CUSTOM TO YOUR GUN BARREL AND CHOKE. For not much more that what you pay for the promo stuff that has some odd shaped shot and some pretty inexpensive components. You spend money to go on the shoot, your time, and so forth, why do all that and just end up shooting ammo that is iffy pattern wise in your gun when you can spend just a little bit more and have some tuned ammo for YOUR gun that GET'S IT DONE. Someone can still get into the hobby without spending themselves into big time debt. But, to do that most will need the help of someone who's been doing this stuff for a few blue moons. Get started with a Lee loader II, not that expensive a investment to see if you are going to like doing this, Hulls you can get from most trap clubs or shooting ranges, I'd call around and see it any of them are selling the used pickup hulls to the public or if you have to join a club to get access to the hulls, A pound of red dot powder goes a long way with one and a eighth once loads, and good ole WAA12 wads can be found pretty easy along with some standard Winchester or Federal 209 primers and some chilled shot to start with. If you end up liking it than I recommend for hunting purposes to load only Magnum hard shot, your patterns will be much tighter and fewer stray pellets, which means that more game will not be getting away. If you come across someone selling a MEC 600 Jr in 12 or 20 gauge for under 150.00 buy it unless someone's having a sale for the same and it's new. Most of the MEC's are built like tanks if you do not abuse them, my oldest I got in 1980 and it is still cranking out great shells.
So, I guess the long and the short is this, if you want to load great ammo that shoots better in your gun for just a few pennies over the price you will pay for the promo stuff, than start loading your own loads. If you only shoot two or three boxes a year, than spend the ten bucks or so for some premium and shoot a few at a 30 inch circle on a large piece of paper standing forty measured yards away. Get a four foot by four foot piece of paper, (kraft paper is good, or even a 4x4 square of cardboard, the more the better,) you have to draw a thirty inch circle in the middle of the 4x4 so there is extra target paper outside the thirty inch circle. Be sure to have a large dot in the middle of you circle target and make five or six of them for testing all of your chokes with. Each target is only good for one shot. Then you have to count each of the holes in the paper within the circle and count the holes outside the circle to see how the shell shoot in your gun and with what choke. Good luck and have fun doing and learning all about your gun and chokes and what really happens down field when you pull the trigger.