Bill Hicks Co vs Orion
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 | Orion | |
|---|---|---|
| Active SKUs | 31,353 | 16,021 |
| Distinct UPCs | 31,350 | 16,021 |
| Shared UPCs (both carry) | 8,460 | |
| Only at this distributor | 22,890 | 7,561 |
| Uptime | 100% | 100% |
| Integration | API | API |
| Freshness | ||
What each one lists most of
Bill Hicks Co and Orion 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
- 14,352
- Hunting & Outdoors
- 4,926
- Ammunition
- 3,433
- Optic
- 2,606
- Magazine
- 2,019
- Reloading
- 1,545
- Parts & Components
- 1,100
- Suppressor
- 535
Orion
- Firearm
- 8,830
- Ammunition
- 2,895
- Parts & Components
- 970
- Magazine
- 752
- Optic
- 402
- Suppressor
- 331
- Knife & Tool
- 177
- Light & Laser
- 157
Firearm, Ammunition, Optic, Magazine, Parts & Components and Suppressor 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 | Orion | |
|---|---|---|
| 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 31,350 distinct UPCs to Orion's 16,021 — about 2× the breadth. 8,460 UPCs are carried by both — 27% of what Bill Hicks Co lists and 53% of what Orion lists. Beyond that overlap, 22,890 UPCs appear on Bill Hicks Co alone and 7,561 on Orion alone. If you open one account, Bill Hicks Co is the wider of the two on its own — it leaves 7,561 UPCs unreachable, against 22,890 if you open Orion instead. Carrying both reaches 38,911 distinct UPCs, 7,561 more than Bill Hicks Co covers alone. The largest category in both lists is Firearm — Bill Hicks Co lists 14,352 there to Orion's 8,830. 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.
Orion
Orion Wholesale runs a general-line catalog roughly in the middle of the size range Project Parabellum syncs, connected through a dealer API on the same schedule as the rest of the API-connected distributors. Its scope stays broad rather than specializing in one category, which is the main reason a dealer would add it alongside a more focused distributor in their mix.
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 Orion dealer account — The general-line catalog makes this a reasonable single account for a dealer not chasing a specific specialty.
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.