Saw a store the other day, that has lots of flashlights and other stuff. I liked 3 types... one holds 1 AAA, another holds 1 AA battery , the third type holds 3 AAA. The three types covered 3 levels of illumination. Exactly what I wanted. BUT, the shop was a wholesale store and the guy only sells them by the BOX (2 dozen each).

Now, I started doing the math. At wholesale price, some are offered at half and some at third of the price I paid a month ago per flashlight. Not bad, but 2 dozen of each is way too much for my needs.

If you were in my place , what would you do ??

Sure. Keep one in every drawer, pocket, glove compartment etc. Christmas gifts to family, kids especially. My nieces and nephews still play with the solar charging flashlights I gave them 2 Christmases ago - they stay in their bedrooms, and they never need batteries, a parent's dream toy. Let there be light.

I popped for 6 LED flashlights for ~$7 at home depot the other day, and may use them as giveaways at fire scenes. All it costs me is pocket change plus 1xAA per flashlight. That I can sustain. I'm not worried about build quality - in fact I've had 2 Fenix 1xAA flashlights go wonky on me in the past couple months, so I don't really have alot of faith in the build quality of most more expensive flashlights anyway. I will EDC at least one better quality light and always keep a supply of lights in my hiking and BOB/emergency kits.

My 2 cents: If you can afford it, buy with both hands. Stock every vehicle and toolbox. Give away tons as stocking stuffers. Then sell the remainder on eBay. Or give them to a Scout troupe for their fundraising.

Advantage of buying in bulk: a few years ago I bought a dozen AMK bivvies from Red Flare Kits, they offered a really good price that netted out ~$9.xx per bivvy. But that gave me flexibility to put a bivvy in the bottom of every daypack and backpack I own, and not have to switch them around when changing packs. When I only had one AMK bivvy, alot of the time I'd head out on the trail with the wrong pack and therefore without an emergency bivvy. Its been great to have a bevvy of bivvies - and I've given some away as door prizes to Scouts and such. I imagine you'd feel the same way staring at a box of flashlights instead of just one or two.

to play the devil's advocate, i wouldn't.

only do it if you like and believe in these lights.

my experience with many cheapie lights is they won't work when you need them. in particular the ones that use multiple batteries. ie: a friend bought a dozen of the type holding 3 AAA. after loading them all and having them around for a few weeks, less than a quarter of them still functioned. that's a 75% failure rate. why? our best guess was too many contact points to corrode with all those leds and same for all the battery contacts, plus poorly made switches.

OTOH, consider the number of folks still daily using their high quality Arc or Peak AAA american-made flashlights that they purchased 10 years ago.

for important lights, i find quality more important than quantity.

but i do understand the need for back-ups everywhere, and giveaway cheapies. for that i buy fauxtons (cheap photon copies) a hundred at a time for around 53 cents each in this quantity.

been buying them from these folks for years:

http://www.qualitychinagoods.com/ultra-b...f7e1c7923fff2ec

If the price was affordable, I'd buy 'em for our Scout group. We can never have too many.

I'd buy bulk like that only if I was planning on flipping it to make a profit. I have no use for that many flashlights, not even during a disaster. I don't buy gear with a plan of handing out gear to my whole block.

Also, flashlight technology is moving just as fast as any other technologies. The cool flashlight today will be outdated technology a few years from now. That may not matter to you, but it's something to keep in mind for those who care.

EDIT:
The Christmas gift idea is a good reason to buy bulk like that.

Make sure there are no design flaws. I bought a buunch of headlamps at Gander and the end caps LOVE to pop off. I have two that are unusable now due to that part missing.

Ironwood