TLDR: retailers and internet traffic is showing that while .270 is still popular with the existing crowds. It is getting blown out of the water on gun sales by new comers like 6.5 prc and is slowly going to die off. Why?
Background: I've got a couple of rifles that shoot fairly well but aren't the most flat shooting (.308, 6.5 creed, .30-06, etc.) I got looking into new calibers for bucking the wind more to serve as a primarily desert based antelope/mule deer gun where the wind is brutal. I took to the internet and everyone was ranting and raving over the 6.5 PRC which almost got me to buy one until I saw ammo costs. I then went to sportsmans ammo section and filtered by lowest cost and found out that the 270 is nearly the same cost as my current calibers. I then got to researching it and immediately was shocked by how good of a cartridge it is and wondering why I had never heard of it before other than old guys with their wood stocked 1970's beauties claiming it can hit a tick on a coon hound. I realized for my hunting distances is effectively the same as the 6.5 prc and fits my goals pretty well. So, the shopping for a .270 rifle began and I realized very few of the higher end brands are making rifles in .270. In fact, across a few different retailers I've seen 2x the offerings of new rifles in 6.5 PRC vs .270 and only medium to budget rifles (tikka or below) offered in .270. I then asked around and couldn't find any hunting friends under the age of 45 who owned a .270. And none under 50 who actively hunted with it. I tried doing research on the caliber and could find many current posts or marketing for it. The ones I did find just talked about how it hasn't modernized as well as the legacy 30 cals. In fact, everyone points back to jack o conner who died 20ish years before I was born and I had never heard of. This ultimately lead me to believe that while the cartridge is still popular with certain shooters. The internet and retailers are showing that new sales and future generations are moving towards other options.
So, ammo is way cheaper, more plentiful, and it's ballistically equivalent to the modern 6.5 prc for hunting distances, and the same recoil. The only downside is a longer action and lesser chamber tolerances. So, why is it slowly dying? Is it just the marketing machine of "new"? Is it really that much easier to be accurate with the tighter tolerances of newer calibers?
. I think there are definitely better rounds to shoot volume than a 270 or any other significant case capacity round.
