Bill Hicks Co vs MGE
Both catalogs are synced into one shared vocabulary, so the same UPC can be counted on either side and matched across them. Everything below is what we measured in the two feeds — how much each one lists, how much of it is the same product, and what only one of them carries.
| Bill Hicks Co | MGE | |
|---|---|---|
| Active SKUs | 30,682 | 5,912 |
| Distinct UPCs | 30,680 | 5,911 |
| Shared UPCs (both carry) | 3,028 | |
| Only at this distributor | 27,652 | 2,883 |
| Uptime | 100% | 100% |
| Integration | API | FTP |
| Freshness | Synced 1 hour ago | Synced 24 minutes ago |
What each one lists most of
Bill Hicks Co and MGE describe their catalogs in their own words, and we resolve both against one shared product vocabulary before counting. A category below therefore means the same thing on either side. Each list is that distributor’s own largest categories, counted in active listings.
Bill Hicks Co
- Firearm
- 13,941
- Hunting & Outdoors
- 4,793
- Ammunition
- 3,408
- Optic
- 2,566
- Magazine
- 2,029
- Reloading
- 1,500
- Parts & Components
- 1,104
- Suppressor
- 509
MGE
- Firearm
- 3,432
- Knife & Tool
- 930
- Other
- 854
- Ammunition
- 465
- Optic
- 231
Firearm, Ammunition and Optic appear in both lists, so those counts can be read against each other directly.
Each list stops at that distributor’s eight largest categories. A category on one list and not the other is one we have not counted here, not one that distributor does not carry.
Where each one will ship it
Taken from each company’s own site on the dates shown on their individual pages. Running a drop-ship programme and naming where the parcel goes are separate questions, and most distributors answer only the first — so “Not stated” below means they have not published it, not that they refuse.
| Bill Hicks Co | MGE | |
|---|---|---|
| Ships to your store | Yes | Yes |
| Offers drop-shipping | Not stated | Not stated |
| Ships to your customer's FFL | Not stated | Not stated |
| Ships to your customer's address | Not stated | Not stated |
| Ships NFA items to a receiving SOT | Not stated | Not stated |
Every distributor here ships to your own licensed premises — that is what a wholesale account is, not a policy any one of them publishes. Confirm anything you will act on directly with the distributor.
Which should you open?
Bill Hicks Co lists 30,680 distinct UPCs to MGE's 5,911 — about 5.2× the breadth. 3,028 UPCs are carried by both — 10% of what Bill Hicks Co lists and 51% of what MGE lists. Beyond that overlap, 27,652 UPCs appear on Bill Hicks Co alone and 2,883 on MGE alone. If you open one account, Bill Hicks Co is the wider of the two on its own — it leaves 2,883 UPCs unreachable, against 27,652 if you open MGE instead. Carrying both reaches 33,563 distinct UPCs, 2,883 more than Bill Hicks Co covers alone. The largest category in both lists is Firearm — Bill Hicks Co lists 13,941 there to MGE's 3,432. Both feeds answered us 100% of the time over the window we monitor.
This is arithmetic on the counts above, not a recommendation of one company over the other. Which account is worth opening also depends on terms and on what your customers ask for, neither of which is in the catalog data we measure. What each company publishes about shipping destinations is in the table above it.
Bill Hicks Co
Bill Hicks & Co. runs a broad catalog that Project Parabellum polls over a dealer API on an automated schedule. Breadth here is a matter of assortment width rather than depth in any one line, so on this hub it shows up as a distributor that has something to say about a lot of different searches. Whether that is worth an account depends on how many narrower distributors you would otherwise be reconciling by hand.
MGE
MGE Wholesale runs a smaller, focused catalog and delivers it to Project Parabellum as scheduled file drops rather than a live API connection. It fits best as a supplemental account in a dealer's distributor mix — a narrower catalog checked alongside a bigger primary feed rather than run instead of one.
Applying for a dealer account
- Apply for a Bill Hicks Co dealer account — Breadth is the reason to open this account; if your other distributors are narrow specialists, this is the one that fills the spaces between them.
- Apply for a MGE dealer account — As a smaller, focused catalog, MGE works best as a supplemental account rather than a dealer's sole distributor. Being an FTP file drop rather than an API, catalog and stock updates arrive on MGE's schedule.
Both links leave this site. Applications are submitted to, reviewed by, and approved by the distributor themselves — Project Parabellum is not part of that process and cannot speed it up or vouch for you.