You say that the new blood doesn't want the work that comes with bench rest. Are you referring to the work of putting on matches or the work involved in developing skills at shooting bench rest? I'd like to address the latter. When I shot in other disciplines, bullseye pistol or Palma, there is a classification system that allows the shooter to have some recognition of their improvement as they progressed from Marksman to Sharpshooter to Expert to Master to High Master. That system allows a shooter to compete against other shooters who are roughly comparable in skill level and equipment. The goal is still to get to the top but it helps and encourages shooters to advance if they see some recognition of the work they have put forth to improve their performance. It's probably too late to attempt to implement a classification system for bench rest as the momentum of the downward spiral is too large. The elites keep shooting and winning while the rest keep eating their dust and get more and more discouraged at seeing no results for their efforts, get weary and just drop out and go to another sport.
Ok, pistol you buy everything in eluding ammo, if you want to load you can for certain matches. Hard ball is out of the box as is center fire and 22. I haven't shot in years but when I started pistol it Master right out of the box, there was no high master then.
You can not buy everything for BR. you have to make it or improve on it and you have to load ...... Pistol, grab your box and go clean and wait for the next relay..... jim