I came to the same conclusion and bought new AMD bumpers. The last car I restored chroming was around $250 a bumper and now it’s triple. The local shops are gone.
Yup, was around the same last time I restored one as well. There used to be three shops here in Saskatoon, two are closed up for good, and the other only does industrial hard chrome now, no decorative automotive.
Sucks when I want to support local business', but when they price themselves to the point where its not financially feasible, it forces a guy to look for other alternatives.