"Hoarding" at Grocery Stores

[apl68]

Yesterday we got warnings of thunderstorms on the way for this morning.  We were supposed to miss the worst of it in our region.  And did.  However, people were pretty frightened yesterday about the slight chance of truly severe weather.  I heard a joking prediction about bread and milk vanishing from the stores.

Yesterday afternoon I made my usual bi-weekly trip to the grocery store, and was startled to see far more people there than usual on a Thursday afternoon.  The milk was indeed mostly gone.  There was not a single two-quart jug left.  I had to be satisfied with one of the last one-quart bottles.  Within another hour there was likely nothing left but maybe some buttermilk and skim milk.  There was still plenty of bread and fresh vegetables, though.

We've all seen these temporary shortages of certain commodities in advance of storms.  I sometimes hear complaints about "hoarding."  But it occurs to me that the real issue is storm forecasts prompting people to bring their shopping forward by a couple of days--it looked yesterday like a lot of people were doing their normal weekend shopping a day or two early.  Since distributors tend to keep supplies of perishables like milk pretty tight in normal times, a sudden bump in demand could easily create a temporary shortage.

Have others here observed odd shopping behavior as a result of weather forecasts or other news reports?  Outside of the pandemic, I don't think I've ever noticed much in the way of panic buying locally, but YMMV for other places and observers.

[onehappyunicorn]

I live in an area that gets hit fairly often by hurricanes. Any time there is a warning the same thing happens, plus everyone buys all the generators from any home improvement store in the area.
I really don't know what everyone is going to do with all the milk and bread, it always struck me as super odd. I guess if they pick up eggs too they could make a ton of french toast or bread pudding.

[lightning]

Oh, yes. Panic shopping-hoarding happens in my town. It's annoying.

I think some people feel a certain degree of comfort and control against the elements, if their cupboards and 'frig are full of food, if & when bad weather is predicted.

[mythbuster]

I lived for a time in North Carolina, where the milk and bread meme is infamous and true. I now live in hurricane country. Your inkling about storm prep is spot on. In addition to moving everyone's weekly trip up, people will also buy more and different items than they otherwise might. So 2 containers of milk instead of one- "just in case".
   Now that we we live in hurricane country I have learned to buy the true dry good staples (canned goods, chips, granola etc.) when the weather is good so we don't have to compete. Also anything that can be frozen away such as bread. Then when the storm is coming, I just stock up on fruit, hard cheeses, and other medium term storage foods that many will overlook because they are convinced they must live off only Spaghetti-O's for the next week (Yuck!). And we now always have a stock of purified water, and many carboys that we can fill ourselves.

[clean]

Is shelf stable milk still a thing?  (Or do we have to fall back on powdered milk or canned milk?)

nothing new here, I think.  Except for the run on toilet paper in COVID.... what was THAT about?

I live in hurricane country, but I also live in an area that frequently (too frequently) has water boil notices.  I have a supply of water, canned goods (with manual can opener!), gas stove, and all things necessary to eat for a few days.  I also have deep cycle batteries and an inverter to run my CPAP machine and even run a TV and satellite dish for a day or so. 

Every house should be required to have a few days of necessities, just as we are required to have boards for our windows, though who enforces that I have no idea! 

For things that can be forecast though, my general plan is to evacuate, so not sure what to make of that!  But for winter storms where there may be no power and impassable roads for much father than a hurricane, what to do?

And just so you know, .... for what it is worth...   Strawberry Pop Tarts!  That seems to be the go to emergency item that Walmart sends to all disaster areas!  Water, ice, strawberry pop tarts! 

Do YOU have an emergency supply/stash?  How long could you last without power if you were stuck at home?  Would you keep your sanity?

Hopefully this weekend is not a test of those questions!
I hope everyone stays healthy and happy!

[bio-nonymous]

For me the most important thing is to have adequate water on hand, since you can live for weeks without eating, but only a few days without water. First thing in a disaster is to fill up your tub and any containers you have so you have potable water in the event of a water supply disruption. We always have at least around 2-3 weeks of drinking water and 4-5 weeks of food (that doesn't require refrigeration) stored, and use/replace regularly so that nothing goes bad. IT just makes sense to us to be prepared for whatever (hurricane, pandemic, power outage, fuel shortage, supply chain collapse. etc.) short-term disaster might disrupt normal everyday existence. Since the great Covid-19 toilet paper shortage, we always have adequate supplies of paper products stored as well. The generator can help preserve our frozen food in our deep freezers (and provide some normalcy since almost EVERYTHING is electric now) and we have extra propane tanks for our grill. For a minimum of a month or so we could live normally regardless of what happens. Living through a few hurricanes, the pandemic, a couple of severe blizzards, and storm-induced multi-day power outages taught me it is better to be prepared than wishing I was...

[Ruralguy]

Honestly, there really shouldn't be as much of a "run" on milk as there once was being storm predictions are much more precise than even 10 years ago. Also, outages tend to last for shorter period of time. Our longest outage in recent years was after winter storm 3 years ago. That lasted from Saturday night into I think Wednesday, although some of town got restored earlier, making it straightforward to go into town and get food.

So, I've never been terribly worried about totally running out of any food at all (or water).

[ciao_yall]

I was also suprised during the pandemic how many people who would normally buy one of something would suddenly feel the need to buy two. A bag of flour, jar of peroxide, etc normally lasts you for weeks. Especially when there are just a few left.

[Parasaurolophus]

nothing new here, I think.  Except for the run on toilet paper in COVID.... what was THAT about?

My understanding is that it wasn't really hoarding, but rather the fact that people were staying home rather than going into the world. So they needed more TP--but also, the TP you buy for home is different from the TP that's made for and sold to businesses. There was no shortage of those big business rolls, only of the ordinary home kind.

[paultuttle]

I was amused a few years ago when a comedian said, "What're they gonna do when the power's out and all they have is milk, eggs, and bread? Cook French toast?"

I think my elderly father's solution is a bit better thought out: He brings his (propane-powered) Coleman camp stove up from the basement whenever there's a possible power outage. Then, if the power outage happens, he pretends he's a Boy Scout again and cooks meals using every single bowl, pan, and cooking utensil in the house. (<grin>)

Power's typically back on within 24 hours (often much less), so the mess is easy to deal with. It's worked for him for ~20 years post-retirement.

[apl68]

We've been very fortunate to have (almost) no power outages in our area during this snow.  The weather has only messed with transport.

I went to Atwood's yesterday and met an employee sprinkling salt on the walk in front of the store.  "Bet you been selling a lot of that lately!" I said.  He replied, "We're just about out, actually." 

I found out at the Mayor's office today that propane is now virtually unobtainable locally.  Partly because late last week some unfortunate person north of town laid in a good stock of it under his carport only to have it blow up and wreck the house when an electrical line under the carport shorted it out.  People think of carports and garages as "out of the house," but really, if something is too dangerous to keep indoors it does not need to be under the carport either.

[dismalist]

Yesterday we got warnings of thunderstorms on the way for this morning.  We were supposed to miss the worst of it in our region.  And did.  However, people were pretty frightened yesterday about the slight chance of truly severe weather.  I heard a joking prediction about bread and milk vanishing from the stores.

Yesterday afternoon I made my usual bi-weekly trip to the grocery store, and was startled to see far more people there than usual on a Thursday afternoon.  The milk was indeed mostly gone.  There was not a single two-quart jug left.  I had to be satisfied with one of the last one-quart bottles.  Within another hour there was likely nothing left but maybe some buttermilk and skim milk.  There was still plenty of bread and fresh vegetables, though.

We've all seen these temporary shortages of certain commodities in advance of storms.  I sometimes hear complaints about "hoarding."  But it occurs to me that the real issue is storm forecasts prompting people to bring their shopping forward by a couple of days--it looked yesterday like a lot of people were doing their normal weekend shopping a day or two early.  Since distributors tend to keep supplies of perishables like milk pretty tight in normal times, a sudden bump in demand could easily create a temporary shortage.

Have others here observed odd shopping behavior as a result of weather forecasts or other news reports?  Outside of the pandemic, I don't think I've ever noticed much in the way of panic buying locally, but YMMV for other places and observers.

I wonder if you live in a State with anti-gouging laws.

A little bit down in this link Gouging there is a list of the few States that do not have such a law.

[ciao_yall]

nothing new here, I think.  Except for the run on toilet paper in COVID.... what was THAT about?

My understanding is that it wasn't really hoarding, but rather the fact that people were staying home rather than going into the world. So they needed more TP--but also, the TP you buy for home is different from the TP that's made for and sold to businesses. There was no shortage of those big business rolls, only of the ordinary home kind.

During the pandemic restaurants were giving away a free roll of TP with takeout. It's not that the TP is always that different, it's just packaged in big cardbord cartons instead of small plastic shrinkwrap.

[apl68]

Our biggest employer is a TP mill, and we still had temporary retail shortages of it here.  Although mainly I recall competition for sanitizer and cleaning supplies.  The massive, sustained increase in demand for bleach, cleaning gloves, etc. made it hard to get those items for months everywhere.

There was indeed an increase in overall demand for TP.  The local tissue mill reportedly hired back about 30 laid-off employees (they had recently shut down some of their other operations) to help crank up production to meet the increased demand.  Which made 30 households in our region happy.  It's an ill wind that blows no one good.