Small point that puzzled me: He said he got a reseller's license to buy stuff for himself from distributors, and he mentioned he bought "a" radar gun. I thought distributors only sold in bulk and the discount only came out because of the bulk part.
Of course, that's "mostly" true. But he was a sixteen year old with a reseller's licence. Most people love to help a kid out. So I'm pretty sure that's what happened, he talked to them and the rules were bent.
That's an even more important lesson that should be spelled out: rules are for shy people who are afraid to ask.
That reminds me of a passage from Jobs' biography. When they started prototyping the Apple I, Woz needed memory chips. But those were expensive and available only in quantity, so they would be hard to get for a prototype. Jobs just called and got the manufacturer to send some samples. That blew Woz' mind.
I've done that trick with chips a few times. Manufacturers want to sell you huge bulk supplies and their costs are so low for things like simple logic or ADC chips that they'll send you a single tube of them just for asking.
You could buy one item at a time from the Ingram Micro D catalog. I believe bulk prices were even cheaper, but you could still buy items individually below retail prices.
