BUMPED by request. Unfortunately, there is a lot of wrong information being discussed and shared. Even reputable regional media are giving inaccurate information, making wrong interpretations {LINK}, and generally getting the explanations wrong. Additionally, there’s general misinterpretations of ordinary outages based on the day of the week (Sunday) and bad weather in the Northeast {ex Twitter Thread}.
All of these #BidensEmptyShelves assumptions, which are being heightened by increased attention and social media, are leading to confusion.
An empty retail shelf or case for a 24, 36 to 48-hour period is not, I repeat, NOT, part of a systemic supply chain disruption. Those are mostly location and regional specific out of stock situations caused by localized events, weather and employee shortages.
What CTH has been describing for the past several months is NOT what is noted above. What we have been describing is a long term supply chain crisis that will slowly unfold over a period of about a week or two, and then remain a problem over time, for a period of 6+ months. {GO DEEP}
The thirteen bullet points below are the issues we will first notice as the general food supply chain begins to show signs of that type of vulnerability. This outline explains why it is happening and how long it can be expected.
In the previous October, November and December warnings, we emphasized preparation and counted down the 90-day window. Now, as we enter the final two weeks before mid/late January, the date of our original prediction, it appears that some media are starting to catch up, and the larger public is starting to notice.
Feel free to note in the comments section what is happening in your area. Hopefully, most of us are much better positioned than the average person who has not been following this as closely over the past several months.
Initial food instability signs in the supply chain. Things to look for:
(1) A shortage of processed potatoes (frozen specifically).
And/Or a shortage of the ancillary products that are derivates of, or normally include, potatoes.
(2) A larger than usual footprint of turkey in the supermarket (last line of protein).
(3) A noticeable increase in the price of citrus products.
(4) A sparse distribution of foodstuffs that rely on flavorings.
(5) The absence of non-seasonal products.
(6) Little to no price difference on the organic comparable (diff supply chain)
(7) Unusual country of origin for fresh product type.
(8) Absence of large container products
(9) Shortage of any ordinary but specific grain derivative item (ex. wheat crackers)
(10) Big brand shortage.
(11) Shortage of wet pet foods
(12) Shortage of complex blended products with multiple ingredients (soups etc)
(13) A consistent shortage of milk products and/or ancillaries.
These notes above are all precursors that show significant stress in the supply chain. Once these issues are consistently visible, we are going to descend into food instability very quickly, sector by sector, category by category.
At first, each retail operation will show varying degrees of the supply chain stress according to their size, purchasing power, and/or private manufacturing, transportation and distribution capacity.
♦ BACKGROUND – Do you remember the dairy farmers in 2020 dumping their milk because the commercial side of milk demand (schools, restaurants, bag milk purchasers) was forcibly locked down? Plastic jugs were in short supply, and the processing side of the equation has a limited amount of operational capacity.
To remind us of how the issues started in 2020, a dairy farmer helps to explain:
“Are we dumping milk because of greed or low demand, no. It’s the supply chain, there are only so many jug fillers, all were running 24/7 before this cluster you-know-what.
Now demand for jug milk has almost doubled. However, restaurant demand is almost gone; NO ONE is eating out.
Restaurant milk is distributed in 2.5 gal bags or pint chugs; further, almost 75 percent of milk is processed into hard products in this country, cheese and butter. Mozzarella is almost a third of total cheese production; how’s pizza sales going right now??
A bit of history – Years ago (40+) every town had a bottler, they ran one shift a day, could ramp up production easily. Now with all the corporate takeovers (wall street over main street) we are left with regional “high efficiency” milk plants that ran jug lines 24/7 before this mess, no excess capacity.
Jug machines cost millions and are MADE IN CHINA. Only so many jugs can be blown at a jug plant. We farmers don’t make the jugs, damn hard to ramp up production.
I’m a dairy farmer, believe me NO dairyman likes dumping milk; and so far there is NO guarantee they will get paid. Milk must be processed within 48 hours of production and 24 hours of receipt in the plant or it goes bad. Same with making it into cheese and butter, and neither stores well for long.
The same supply line problems exists where restaurants are supplied with bulk 1 pound blocks of butter or single serv packs or pats; and cheese is sold in 10 to 20 pound bags (think shredded Mozzarella for pizza). Furthermore, it is not legal for this end of the supply chain to sell direct to consumers in most states.
Take cheddar cheese for instance; it goes from mild to sharp to crap in storage. Butter, frozen, only stores for so long and then must be slowly thawed and processed into other uses as it gets “strong”. At Organic Valley we cook it down into butter oil or ghee for cooking.
We are headed for the same problem with canned veggies. The vast majority of produce comes off and is processed in season; canned or frozen. The supply is already in cans for the season; restaurants use gallon cans or bulk bags of frozen produce.
At some point we will run out of consumer sized cans in stock because home size sales are up (40%+) and restaurant sales are almost nonexistent. Fresh produce out of U.S. season comes from Mexico (different climate). I’m talking sweet corn, green beans, peas, tomatoes, all veggies are seasonal in the USA. Fresh, out-of-season, row crops are imported. (There are exceptions, like hydroponic grown, but small amount of total).
Someone mentioned “time to raid all those bins of corn”. Those bins on the farm contain yellow corn, cattle feed and totally unfit for human consumption, now or at harvest.
Eggs? Same problem. Bakeries and restaurants of any size use Pullman egg cases, 30 dozen at a pop, 30 eggs to a flat, 12 flats to a case. There are only so many 1 dozen egg cartons available and only so many packing machines.
Industrial bakeries and processors of packaged food buy bulk liquid eggs, no carton at all. Also in many states it is illegal to sell this supply-chain directly to consumers.
On your standard buffet of any size, do you really think they boil eggs and peel them? They come in a bag, boiled and diced; those nice uniform slices of boiled egg you see on your salad, a lot of them come in tubes boiled and extruded at the same time, just unwrap and slice. Your scrambled eggs come in a homogenized bag on most buffets.
Another example of Main Street being gutted and “improved by wall street” NO local egg processors available or many small egg producers either, all corporate and huge, contracted to sell to the corporate masters.
This is a warning the same problems exist in all supply chains.
The supply chain is farked.”
~ David Osterloh, Dairy Farmer
Potato farmers and fresh food suppliers were also told to dump, blade or plough over their crops due to lack of commercial side demand. These issues have longer term consequences than many would understand. These are fresh crops, replenishment crops, which require time before harvest and production.
The retail consumer supply chain for manufactured and processed food products includes bulk storage to compensate for seasonality. As Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue noted in 2020, “There are over 800 commercial and public warehouses in the continental 48 states that store frozen products.”
Here is a snapshot of the food we had in storage at the end of February 2020: over 302 million pounds of frozen butter; 1.36 billion pounds of frozen cheese; 925 million pounds of frozen chicken; over 1 billion pounds of frozen fruit; nearly 2.04 billion pounds of frozen vegetables; 491 million pounds of frozen beef; and nearly 662 million pounds of frozen pork.
This bulk food storage is how the total U.S. consumer food supply ensures consistent availability even with weather impacts. As a nation, we essentially stay one harvest ahead of demand by storing it and smoothing out any peak/valley shortfalls. There are a total of 175,642 commercial facilities involved in this supply chain across the country
The stored food supply is the originating resource for food manufacturers who process the ingredients into a variety of branded food products and distribute to your local supermarket. That bulk stored food, and the subsequent supply chain, is entirely separate from the fresh food supply chain used by restaurants, hotels, cafeterias etc.
Look carefully at the graphic. See the fork in the supply chain that separates “food at home (40%)” from “food away from home (60%)”?
Food ‘outside the home’ includes restaurants, fast food locales, schools, corporate cafeterias, university lunchrooms, manufacturing cafeterias, hotels, food trucks, park and amusement food sellers and many more. Many of those venues are not thought about when people evaluate the overall U.S. food delivery system; however, this network was approximately 60 percent of all food consumption on a daily basis.
The ‘food away from home‘ sector has its own supply chain. Very few restaurants and venues (cited above) purchase food products from retail grocery outlets. As a result of the coronavirus mitigation effort, the ‘food away from home’ sector was reduced by 75% of daily food delivery operations. However, people still needed to eat. That meant retail food outlets, grocers, saw sales increases of 25 to 50 percent, depending on the area.
Covid regulations and lockdowns destroyed this complex supply chain in 2020.
It takes time to recover, because the replenishment is based on harvest cycles. This stuff must be grown.
When the food at home sector was forced to take on the majority of food delivery, they immediately hit processing constraints. The processing side of the supply chain to funnel food into suppliers for the grocery store has “x” amount of capacity. That system cannot (not feasible) / did not expand to meet the 20 to 50% increase in demand.
Think about potatoes. A potato farmer sells into one of the two paths “food at home” (retail stores, or a processing supplier) or “food away from home” (commercial food or commercial food processors). Other than bulk raw potatoes, the harvest goes into: (1) processing or (2) storage.
(1a) processing for retail sales (40%), ex. Ore Ida frozen potatoes, canning, or any of the other thousand retail products that use potatoes, whole or mashed.
(1b) processing for commercial sales (60%), ex. McDonalds french fries, or any of the thousand restaurant, lunchroom and cafeteria needs that use potatoes, whole or mashed.
♦ Processing – When 1b was shut down in 2020, 1a quickly reached maximum retail processing capacity. Massive multi-million machines and food processing systems have a capacity. The supplies they use also have a capacity: plastic bags, cardboard, trays, bowls, etc. The 1a processing system can only generate “X” amount of retail product at maximum capacity.
The remaining 1b commercial product was shut down. A massive percentage of 1b (commercial) potatoes have nowhere to go, except waste.
♦ Storage – Each processor in 1a stores product (deep cold or frozen storage) for 365-day processing and distribution. Those storage facilities have a limited amount of capacity. The 1b customers need fresh product for the majority of their outlets. Ergo, storing for 1b customers who might eventually be allowed to open later only works for a short period of time. The fresh potato sales missed by 1b outlets = the 1b discard by potato farmers.
When you restart 1b suddenly the 1b short term (fresh) storage product is quickly depleted. Refilling that 2020 storage is dependent on a new 2021 harvest, which simultaneously has a greater immediate demand because the supply chain on the processing side was boxcar’d (over capacity) and then reset to a higher capacity playing catchup.
The amount missing from 2021 storage, because it was used instead of saved, is essentially equal to the amount that was wasted in 2020.
Now you end 2021 with less reserves because storage is depleted, because a greater percentage of the current harvest was immediately used. You enter into the beginning of 2022 (winter) in a race to try and spread out the stored potatoes as you cross your fingers and race against the clock for the next harvest before running out.
You probably noticed – but attached to this issue is yet another motive to keep people (employees) away from large industrial cafeterias and even students from school lunchrooms. The total food supply chain needs time, and harvests, to catch up.
In the example above you can replace *potato* with just about any row crop or retail/commercial food commodity like milk.
The reason I list the shortage of potatoes as the #1 precursor is because every food outlet sells a potato in some form. Every supermarket and every single restaurant (fancy, sit down or fast food) sells some form of potato. Potatoes are demanded by every single food outlet; therefore, a shortage of potatoes is the first noticeable issue.
The 2020 demand disruption problem now becomes a 2021/2022 supply chain problem on both the fresh and processing side (depleted inventories), with each vector now competing for the same raw material: wheat, soybeans, grains, beans and stored row crops.
Making matters worse, the protein suppliers also need grain as feed for cattle, pigs, cows, chickens, etc.
[Note: who gets the short straw? The pet food manufacturers]
That’s the nub of the background supply chain issue in the food sector. Additionally, recovery is not a single-issue problem.
The recovery price and shortages relate to everything from current oil and gas prices to diesel engine oil prices, to fertilizer and weed killer costs, to plastic costs and petroleum packing shortages (Styrofoam especially), to cardboard and sustainable packaging costs, to energy costs and transportation/delivery costs. All along this complex supply chain there’s also workers and higher payroll costs.
Thus, we get the double-edged sword of higher prices (inflation) and simultaneous shortages.
Here’s what you can do to offset grocery store shortages (while possible):
(1) Buy the generic or store brand equivalent (sub-set inside retail supply chain)
(2) Purchase the organic version (another sub-set inside retail supply chain)
(3) Purchase the powered/dehydrated version (potatoes, milk, etc) and experiment (jazz it up).
Each retail operation, or chain of stores, will show varying degrees of the supply chain stress according to their size, purchasing power, and/or private manufacturing, transportation and distribution capacity.
This is where field to fork supplier relationships can make a big difference. However, every outlet regardless of their operational excellence, is going to have significant shortages in their inventory. It’s an unavoidable outcome of the previous chaos.
On average, the retail shortages will last for about as long as one full harvest schedule (4 to 6 months) depending on the commodity. By September of 2022, the various sector should be relatively recovered.
However, government intervention could make the issues worse, or the recovery time take longer, depending on how they respond when people get seriously stressed in a few weeks. The densely populated urban areas are going to be making a lot of noise and demanding the government fix the crisis.
Final note on INFLATION – The short term prices will go up again. Another 10, 20 up to 50% should be expected depending on the item. Those prices will eventually level off, but it’s doubtful they will be able to come back down until supply and demand find some equilibrium again, if ever. Right now, predicting future retail prices is too far off to even fathom.
I hope this outline provides you with information to help you make decisions for your family.
A couple of days ago i shared this list with a friend who responded:
Just got home from grocery shopping and was commenting to the wife on all the stuff that was either in short supply or just completely missing. So seeing this list after the fact is interesting.
Can confirm experiencing 1,2, (massive glut of large frozen hams as well, filling a whole freezer area that usually houses other stuff) 3, 5, 9, 10, 12. Some of the other phenomena on the list may well have been noticed had I the awareness to specifically look for them. Next time I’ll be scrutinizing everything.
The hams. Same thing where I’m at. I noticed this over the holiday week. A huge pile of smoked hams at almost half off. Packed my freezer. I don’t think they’re on sale anymore. They still have a freezer load.
You can also shop online with companies such as My Patriot Supply, and lay in stocks of freeze-dried foodstuffs in mylar packaging that has a shelf life measured in decades, not months. These are not MREs; these are real, tasty, nutritious foods.
But generally have way too much salt in them. I found them utterly unpalatable when I tried them. Maybe OK for hikers, but not for folks staying at home.
and icky combinations. why don’t they make simple food we all eat instead of getting creative.
You are correct but watch the sodium on those products.
Not gluten free. I have 2 autoimmune diseases that require me to be gluten free, and low salt as well.
Latter Day Saints has the best supply of staples at a reasonable price. Flour, Sugar, Oats, beans (pinto/black/white), apples, carrots, potato flakes, dry milk, etc. They come in cases of six gallon sized cans. Last 20-30 years from packing. Order today…you should have within a week. I have some of the my patriot supply stuff, but they are higher sodium and low on fruits/vegetables and proteins (though they do sell those items separately from their long term packs). Never been a prepper type prior to about 3 months ago. Been buying food and PM over investing in the stock market over that time period. Probably going to do one final shopping this week to round out my longer term stuff with some midrange (canned fruits, canned meats, etc.). Also going to stop by the liquor store and pick up some vodkas, gins, whiskeys and some other tradeable alcohols (once dollars and precious metals aren’t taken as currency…alcohol will be currency…hopefully it doesn’t get to that point and I get to drink the stuff over many years….). 2020 was the election year for BLM/Antifa chaos, Summer of 2022 is going to be the election year of the “food wars” (smash and grabs of grocery stores will be going down everywhere as food becomes more valuable than currency)…perfect timing for the election and martial law.
Disgusted – Thxs 4 great post,
There are cheaper ways to buy these things. I order 50# bags of grain and store them in 5 gallon buckets using dry ice to squeeze out the oxygen. Here in Utah there are food storage businesses that sell this stuff and they are cheaper and higher quality than the church sells. Azure Standard sells all over the country, but their supplies have been inconsistent since a few years before Covid and their service has deteriorated. They expanded too fast. Food Coops often will sell bulk food. I bought my garden seeds early. My milk is bottled locally with reusable bottles and my meat comes directly from a ranch in the mountains. I am also thankful to have these skills as I have been living this way my whole life. With shortages sprouting seeds will provide fresh produce. I just saw my first bare spots at the local grocery store this week.
If you listen to Glenn Becks interview of Trump, his comment that energy prices is driving all of this hit home. as an example, It’s one thing to transport raw potatoes to the store, quite another if you process them, think, haul to plant, wash, peel slice or dice, boil, whip par fry for French fries or dry them, all takes a lot of energy, plus can or freeze or dry, more energy, then package and trans again, maybe keep frozen. Plastic containers the list is endless. All is oil and energy, electric is energy based no matter how “green” Green energy is driving one hell of a lot of this, plus people not going back to work and government restrictions (distortions) in the labor market. Buy potatoes by the bag, raw, they keep and learn to cook. It will be you saving grace.
I love the highly ironic “beauty and charm” ! 🙂
By which words we mean “boggle-eyed threats and hysterical lies.”
every time I see her face all I can see is a donkey, bug eyed, buck toothed and braying like an ass. And she thinks i would want to date her, not since i was in my horny teens, and that is what she reminds me of, a spoild teen princess who gets away with being stupid by looking “cute” . See her tax the rich dress, CUTE, and stupid
My favorite parody:
“all I can see is a donkey, bug eyed, buck toothed and braying like an ass.”
What is the democrat mascot again?….oh yeah a jackass.
She’s the perfect choice
BINGO, WE GOT A WINNER. A true demonrat
Yes, low IQ foreigners somehow being elected in a country they hate and want to destroy is a very big problem. No one even looks at their citizen status! When people go hungry things will fall apart rapidly. We do not have a military big enough to police/fight in every city and town in the country. Hopefully the idiots running this country into the ground don’t cause total meltdown…
They trained everybody not to look at citizen status when they used “conspiracy theory” for the first time (well, in “modern times”) for any question of where the heck O came from. Just like the election—NO COURT CASES ALLOWED, NO QUESTIONING ALLOWED. Even the talk radio people would immediately hang up if a caller mentioned it.
Bongino did a great rant today about Where the Heck Have All the Anti-Authority, Distrust the Gov, Hate the Intel Agency people gone….and he’s right. I was part of that left, but I’d be ashamed to admit being part of this group of sheep who repeat anything they hear from “experts” (maybe they’re parrots) and never, ever question.
AOC is not a Senator. 🙂
Thank goodness, at least she has to get re-elected every couple of years and is one of hundreds.
Even with that, she doesn’t seem very “diluted,” does she?
not yet, but the people of NY are definitely stupid enough to change that
AOC is a representative to the House, not Senate, at least for now.
AOC is still a Rep but she will be looking to primary Schumer for the Senate seat coming up.
You are right though. Her Econ degree from Boston University only qualified her to be a part-time barkeep.
AOC was elected to Congress not the Senate. But she has still managed to cause a lot of problems because of her lust for power and running other peoples lives. The only thing that saves us is she is dumb as a board. She actually believes the Climate Change disaster fairy tale.
Which brings up another point. If the democrats manage to pass major parts of their “Build Back Better” bill it will be an energy disaster for the US and the world’s climate will do whatever it was going to do anyway. Right now the energy industry is sitting on their hands in the West waiting to see what happens. They have simply refuse to fight the Climate Change Myth in public. The AGW movement hoax would have been much more easily discredited and shut down 10 years ago but now become far harder to stop because it has become part of the Left’s propaganda program and will be harder to get pass the MSM wall of lies. The “green” power sources will fail because they are not thermodynamically and economically viable (the energy density is to low and nothing is going to change that). Which means electrical power will continue to be more and more unreliable and expensive. Hydrocarbon fuels and plastics will have to come from overseas sources which means higher and higher costs and be more subject to supply disruptions. This will compound the country’s supply and transportation issues. The US Oil Industry will simply move offshore increasing OPEC’s power over the energy markets. These energy cost and reliability issues will compound the other problems with the supply chain.
Let’s correct sato several more times – don’t you people read any posts before you make your own or do you just like to dogpile?
Fact checking in an anonymous world.
Just wait until the grammar police show up, I hear the sirens already…:D
At least everyone seems to know AOC’s name; how many other newer reps can we say that about?
God bless the grammar police in this era when everybody thinks “hooker” is spelled with just an H and and O…and now they even purposefully (but their followers will think it’s real) misspell “the” as “thee” (well, that’s the spelling police, but we’re the same people)
I didn’t read other comments this time, sorry. But often it takes time for the comments to get posted so when someone reads and responds to your comments other comments that say the same thing are not posted yet. That is why it seems like piling on. Relax the comment I made about her being in the house was a side comment. The main point I was making was that AOC and the democrats will use climate change to make the supply chain problems worse. All of their Green energy solutions are doomed to failure. We found that out last winter in Texas, the wind mills all failed at the time electrical power was needed the most.
I read about the frozen hash brown crisis. There are few things easier to do than shredded potatoes for hash browns. A few russet potatoes and a box shredder. Blot them as dry as possible. They’ll turn pinkish. Matters not. Cook them right away. Wonderful!
Other than once a year buying a bag of Tater Tots to go w/Sloppy Joe’s I do not buy any kind of frozen potato. I did try a Treeper recipe at Thanksgiving using shredded potatoes, it was good, but I never think to purchase frozen. And for the fresh I rarely peel them, those days are over, skin goes in w/everything else called for in the recipe.
How did we get off topic on AOC? I doubt she can boil water.
Anybody think that a single soul in charge in DC has any idea about all this disruption and what they’ve done to make it worse?
Amazing, isn’t it? How America’s food supply works.
If not disrupted by the idiots in Washington, it works like a well oiled machine. Americans are so ingenious.
Makes one think that the wrong people are in government and in charge of running the country. The ones who ought to be running the country are the ones out in the country who make things work. The ones who are in the government running the country ought to be out in the field picking cotton.
😎
P. S. That means SUNDANCE should be President!
Wolverine at least.
You are right. Brainless twats like AOC will be our undoing. She should be tending bar. This 60 IQ creature has no business in making any national policy decisions.
What should we do with Omar Ilhan? And Arrianna Pressley? Oh and that idiot porn writer who thinks she ought to be governor of Georgia. I’ve been trying to forget her name and I think I’ve been successful. What is wrong with the people who elect these foreigners and idiots? SMH.
Tribalism. You know that quality BHO accused US of after we voted for PDT?
The Occasional Cortex cannot be fixed. Our world is full of them. We will never know stupid until we see what people do. Then we can weed out the stupid. Do you read me, New Yorkers? Or is it too late for you.
Hey, this is the era in which Sotomeyer’s on the Supreme Court! (Did you know that deadbrain people make spontaneous actions? Now you do.)
I get we tend to focus most of the ire on government but don’t discount the fascist corporations whose leaders are all-in on this bioweapon and economic destruction operation. They’re working hand in glove with their counterparts in government.
Note how corporations are implementing draconian rules well in advance of government edicts, completely antithetical to historical practice. It’s conspiracy and collusion.
Seems to be working pretty well. IDK, perhaps there’s a peaceful solution but I’m not seeing it. Apparently we’re not suffering enough yet. Perhaps in time.
These fascist corporations are going to kill the goose that laid the golden egg! They will regret what they are doing. I just don’t understand why they are trying to kill the economic engine of the world. How can they NOT understand that.
IDK, perhaps it’s showing my age but what’s happening goes against everything I learned in industry and business.
Historically we fought the government tooth and nail on volumes of regulations and mandates, some big, some small, and I worked when industry was quite a dangerous place to make a living; still is in some parts.
Still, corporations fought for their bottom line and hated giving any of it away to the edicts of the government. Doesn’t seem to be the case with Covid. Very odd.
Same people. They move in and out of corporate boards, media, lobbying, government….reading The Laptop From Hell only proved the point. Of COURSE, FJB said “China is not our enemy” (in a condescending, what-are-you, stupid?) voice. “Cause hey, he and Xi are best buds and Hunter’s in in tight, and the Kerry family, and there’s plenty for everybody —- in their little circle of iligarchs.
Imagine a man so vile that he sets his son on the path of being a corrupt goon for foreign leaders his wh0le life…so he, the big-guy-gets-a-kickback — can claim to have “clean hands” — “never a scandal.” That’s our joe.
They won’t be touched. They plan to keep the bare minimum of interchangeable “workers” (most of it will be done by tech, of course) and rule the world. They are their OWN “economic engine” with solo oligarchs having more money than many small countries.
That’s the plan.
if we were living by our own constitution, it would be mostly irrelevant how smart or dumb our “leaders” are because they would not be touching most of our lives in any meaningful way. the founders were not stupid: they had a method to avoid the lives of Americans being interrupted by useless or even evil politicians.
we’ve lost the plot.
IMO thats the larger issue. we simply take for granted, now, that they are “in charge” of everything. and thus, every problem demands that the government “do something about it.”
If We The People are in charge of our Government, as is described in our Constitution, We can be free again. Going down this long path towards Totalitarian Government will end very badly, even for the lemmings who want their Government to be their “Daddy”. Time to fix the dysfunctional to functional families ratio. Higher and higher percentages of families without real Dads will invariably lead to Totalitarian Governments.
The fix starts at the family levels and primarily with teaching young men, who grow up fatherless, how to be fathers themselves. Instead of the 1619 Projects, we need classroom help for these children from dysfunctional families. If we are thinking about divorcing our spouses, maybe we need to think more about how we keep what is of more value than what we dislike about them. We cannot fix our political system when our own behavior exacerbates the problems of that system. We all have to try harder or we will lose everything that made this Country great in the first place.
Just a thought or two, poorly written, of course.
The interview cited with the farmer mentions several times that “it is illegal” for the food processors for the restaurant/ institutional food chain to sell directly to the consumer. Is this true ? Why ?
How could I research this , becasue if this is indeed true, this needs to change.
It varies state by state and localities. Check your health department. Plus the distributor has requirements for credit and accounts. It’s stupid
Plus, if the stuff under commercial contract in 2020 just went to the store there would’ve been a price crash and every farmer would’ve lost money, not just a few.
We the people exacerbated the problem: everyone over bought causing a problem. I went to pick up dinner at a restaurant for Mother’s Day 2020. When I got there, I saw a sign listing the price for meat. It was very reasonable and I would’ve gone their every week to buy meat during the “shutdown” but I had no idea they were doing it.
I think it would’ve been a lot better had restaurants been encouraged to keep bringing in food as normal, but sell it uncooked. Obviously packaging would’ve been an issue at some point, but I think creativity would’ve kicked in. It may not had been perfect, but I think we would be in a better place now had the focus been on maintaining the status quo by working on methods to provide cooked and uncooked meals from restaurants to supplement .
The whole “2 weeks” was a farce. The CDC types knew it but didn’t tell anyone they planned on dragging it out as long as they could. I think Perdue and Navarro would’ve came up with some type of solution if the CDC types had said: “we plan on shutting down for months” . They, unlike AOC and Buttigieg, would’ve known the ramifications at the beginning. A 2-week hiccup is doable, not 4 to 12+ months (depending on what part of the country).
I agree. If we had known the length of time the shutdown would have lasted, we could have also planned better to learn skills and accomplish projects. But it is difficult to decide to start something when you had no idea how long you would have to finish it!
My friend is a Union Waitress, working at the large hotels in Pittsburgh..early in April of 2020 she was laid off and told there would be no big events until 2021..how did her union reps know this?? Thats when I knew we were in trouble.
Reminds me of when we lived in San Diego, 7 years ago. We were close to the water and would go to the docks when the fishing boats came in – usually early morning. As an ordinary citizen, you could not buy fish from those boats. All the fish was for the local restaurants, period. The boat owners would be put out of business if they sold to individuals.
Next time go to Point Loma Seafoods. Fish right off the boat but sold as retail and made into sandwiches etc. Yum. You can also buy the fish too.
Point Loma is gorgeous.
That’s the same issue with the dairy farmers near me in WI. Everyone with an Instapot can pasteurize milk at home, but the farmers are not allowed to sell to me directly. It’s a stupid waste of resources!!
It is true, depending on the state, CO waived the requirement as did TX.
Not sure if those waivers still stand though, as people may need to use the commercial side of the food chain & help keep restaurants afloat.
Problem is commercial side shut down and nothing was available for me to purchase either, I had to buy some retail stuff to stay open or at least fill holes that I could not get.
I still cannot get a lot of it… without some major planning. See my post up the thread.
yeah in my state they began allowing restaurants to sell from their bulk supplies directly to consumers, and it was quite helpful to them and to keep the restaurants afloat when they struggled to get customers in. So you could go to Applebees (just making up an example) and buy a couple pounds of raw ground beef.
Where I live, west-central Idaho mountains, it is illegal for meat cutters and processors (for both will game and stock from local farmers) to sell portioned meat to the public. So the farmers have to get their meat pre-sold first, and only then can have the animal killed and butchered. We were told that it is because of the USDA regulations, as meat sold by portion has to be USDA inspected and certified.
Support your local farmers, buy local meat, if you have the means to store it.
Just for reference, we bought half a cow (grass-fed, grass-finished) in the summer and it cost us $3,200 (at $4/lb of hanging weight). By fall, same quality whole pig was $600.
In PA it seems like I can buy a 1/4 – 1/2 or whole animal directly from the farmer, they have it butchered and I pick up.
But if that farmer wants to sell it ‘legally’ at their farm stand it has to be a USDA certified butcher.
Yep, that’s exactly how it works. Retail cuts must be USDA-certified, but there is a loophole in the law for farmers to sell directly (in larger quantities) to customers and have it butchered in a lower-cost non-USDA plant.
The difference is in paying a USDA inspector as a full-time on-site observer, this salary is too much overhead to bear for a small butchering operation. Small independent plants know to keep everything spotlessly clean without the constant oversight, since their business reputation depends upon it.
We just took delivery of half a cow at $1700, also grass fed and finished. Wow what a difference in price. Mine included delivery. North eastern Tennessee.
I’m in Huntsville, AL, who’d you go to? I’ve been wanting to buy a “cow” but have been putting it off, but would like to find somewhere in the region with a good “tasting” animal.
I just found several options in your area by searching on DuckDuckGo for this string👇
huntsville al grassfed beef farmer
If that were true then how do they explain farmers markets, orchards and small mom and pop shops?
They follow USDA rules and the prices show it.
Didn’t O try to make farmers’ markets illegal? Wanted to control them, just like the standing water on your land and the light bulbs in your fixtures.
Legal is simply what a bunch of pinheads in suits say it is, enforced out the barrel of a gun.
Parallel economy. Embrace it. Leave the pinheads behind. I hope people are getting they don’t care whether we live or die. All that matters to them is control and power. It wasn’t always like that, there was a balance in the pinhead kingdom. Now they’ve gone full potato.
agreed. if you claim to “not consent” then laws made by an illegitimate regime are no longer relevant and you should simply disregard them.
Exactly! I buy from a small local farmer/rancher. Pork, beef and their eggs!!! My scrambled eggs are almost orange in color!! It’s a drive but worth it. Wish I could find a local dairy for fresh milk, cream & butter, though I wouldn’t mind making my own butter,
I live in Indiana, at the beginning of the lockdown in 2020 a locally owned steakhouse chain sold all of their product, meat and produce, to the public to get rid of it. So apparently it isn’t illegal here.
Mostly it is due to the differing labelling requirements. Retail packaging requiring substantially more information “for the consumer.”
joebama’ s answer to the problem “Let them eat cake”
Does any of this lessen IF the Supreme Court finds the mandates unconstitutional?
no. the damage has been done. they could make it worse though.
Going to make is worse as the truckers refuse to be vaxed. And they only have about a week or so before the truckers quit or are terminated over the damn Vax.
. 70+ % of goods are trucked.
I went to Walmart again this AM and it is weird watching this play out. They have rearranged the store, shortening shelves and creating random large open spaces with nothing at all. They had everything I needed, though. But I was there around 7:30am.
Last week, I asked and an older guy stocking said very few trucks coming in. but there had been bad weather so that may have had some impact. Today another older guy again said trucks, but blamed it on baby boomers, like him retiring, and not enough employees to drive them. Not the reason today, but I happen to know that was an upcoming concern for the trucking industry PRIOR to all of this mess.
However, given that the stock on the shelves seems highly managed to have a little bit of everything you need, I have to wonder if there are less trucks because there are just delivering what some alogrhythm somewhere determined is most needed and nothing more.
You don’t get panicked if most of what you want is on the shelves. I think the reason they shortened the shelves is so you don’t notice that there is so many fewer brands or specific types of, for example, razors or wheat crackers. Instead of multiple varietes of brown sugar and there were just two scartons full of the Great Value light brown sugar bags, no dark or other brands. I wanted cereal and they had almost everything on the shelves but what I wanted, however, I looked up and there were 6 boxes on the top shelf that they brought down. Since I was stocking up, I had intended to get 4 boxes and store it, but I felt guilty and only took 2 boxes instead.
I’ve also been buying dog food. I bought quite a bit of it actually (dry). Two reasons, one it is going to get expensive and two, I don’t care if the dog thinks its a bit stale when we get around to it. She gets plenty of table scraps.
Last week I noticed the smaller bags (5#) were less expensive per ounce as compared to the exact same brand/flavor than the big and great big bags of the same brand….as well as cheaper per ounce than the really big bags of the cheaper brands like purina. I have no idea what dogfood used to be per ounce, but I’d say the prices are at least 25 to 30% higher overall.
Interesting about taking less because you felt guilty.
At my local grocery store the milk case was very bare, only a few jugs of the store brand. I did notice that a couple guys in the back put a few more jugs in but it seemed like they were leaving the bulk of the milk in the crates behind the shelves.
Perhaps they’re using that method as a tactic so people take less to stretch out the stock.
….” Since I was stocking up, I had intended to get 4 boxes and store it, but I felt guilty and only took 2 boxes instead.”…..
I do the same. It feels like a “pay it forward” thang. I just assume the person who took some before I got there was in the same frame of mind, but decided to leave some for ME. (!)
And let’s face it, when you’re pretty well prepared beforehand, it’s the kind of thing you can afford to do.
Vax mandates for truckers but no testing or vax mandates for illegal invaders.
We don’t like double standards. Obviously the Biden administration relishes discriminating against Americans.
Another sign of O’s hands helping the banking/billionaire classes steer the Wheel of Destruction.
We’re awaiting a late package that seems to be hung up in CA. Researched and found that the postmaster general is changing ALL the US.mail from planes to trucks. And, he says sadly, “We don’t have enough truckers.” (in CA, esp I bet, huh?)
Not kidding—never would have believed it if I hadn’t read it.
Is that going to mess things up to all kinds of crazy? You betcha.
I have seen this coming….I live in farm country in Ohio, and we have seen ALL that Sundance is writing about here AS FACT….Take heed folks. We’ve been stocking up for the biggest part of the year….Good luck to all, and BE WISE MY FELLOW AMERICANS….
Hi! Fellow Buckeye and Treepers. Totally agree. We started stocking back when O-Loser was elected, slacked off here and there on certain things, rotated items, but picked back up weekly stocking when the Scamdemic hit.
I am still in disbelief this is actually happening …..HERE……in America.
‘Nother rural Buckeye here. Local small-chain market (Riesbeck’s) has not had any shortages of fresh meat or milk. Perhaps because their sources are local, too?
I have 2 HEBs within 5 minutes which I use for recurring curbside order. Last week a note popped up saying the 71 store no longer carried a product check Lakeway store. The order did not fill paper products. When I went to the Lakeway store, yesterday, I got the products but as mentioned no frozen potatoes and HEB milk on sale.
You must be close to Lake Travis. Sure do miss my hill country and HEB, but not the lunatic transplants.
I went to one of the local supermarkets last Wed. and was shocked to see about 20 ft. of nearly empty shelves in the meat case where the chicken normally “roosts”. They had several packages of chicken gizzards, and a couple of bone-in,split chicken breasts. I felt like I was in the Soviet Union! I remember thinking that maybe it had something to do with the huge rise in feed costs. The next day, the wife and I went to Wal-Mart ( I know.. the Made in China store that has destroyed the mom and pop retailers in towns across America!) and went to the pet food aisle to get canned cat food for our flock of cats. To my shock and dismay, there were maybe a dozen cans of some odd-ball brands left, although I guess that would be a good time for an associate to wipe clean the empty shelves! I tell people, and they say it’s because of Covid-19. I have to remind them that the China Virus didn’t cause it, our government’s lockdowns and mandates caused it .
What I noticed in the FSU shortly after the end of Communism was both stores like how you describe, with the empty shelves and also low prices, as well as small ’boutique’ stores for people who had money. Being from the US my dollars bought a lot of food when converted to rubles and hryvna.
The parallel economy, epitomized by the farmer’s market, was robust. Plenty of fresh food options for people. I noted that due to poor power distribution and reliabilty and cost, many people didn’t store perishables. In winter I stored my stuff on the window ledge in the cold. Most people I noticed bought only enough for a couple days, I presume due to money being short.
When that happens here, I guess it already is, I won’t be surprised. My parents dealt with the same thing during the Depression.
I continue to be impressed by how brilliant the Communists have been, taking advantage of Trump’s booming economy and cheap energy prices to disperse and arm their mercenaries and support their violence and death around the country, then crash the economy to make it harder for patriots to coordinate and rise up. Masterful. I think they’ll get a few surprises though. We’ll see.
Chicken gizards are rather good if trimmed and baked with some liquid and seasoning low temp until very tender. Make gravy and make your own mashed potatoes. A small town VFW in IL used to have this as an appetizer.
Buy fresh veggies from farmers markets…VERY cheap (and article answers why)
in the middle of winter ? no outside mkts in this cold northern zone . #why Florida looks good
Farmers markets here on the North Olympic Peninsula (WA) are fairly expensive. Very high prices for common items I started growing myself like tomatoes and cucumbers. After the markets went Covid crazy with masks and hand washing stations, I stopped going.
That doesn’t work too well in January. Our local farm doesn’t reopen until March.
To have farmer’s markets, you need to have farmers. Not many farmers in the desert (AZ).
Yeah, and, perhaps antithetically, where I historically lived we had few farmers markets, none where I resided, but was smack dab in the midst of some of the most productive irrigated desert on the planet.
Problem? It was and is predominantly gigantic economies of scale production farming. Miles of tomatoes, onions, garlic, lettuce, melons, you name it, and tens of thousands of acres of nuts, fruits, grapes, etc. Everything, generally, is big. Hundred thousand turkeys in one husbandry unit? No problem. Milk ten thousand cows? Yup. Feed lot for beef cattle stretching for miles? Yes sir.
These economies of scale in production, and processing, are what bring America nutritious and inexpensive food in consistent quantity. Covid kinda messed that up.
I dealt with the fallout of it in business; customers would bring sacks of onions and potatoes, crates of melons, bins of oranges, etc, everything sized in field to market at minimum, or larger. Completely beyond my ability to use/store. Loved the gifts but whoa. They simply weren’t equipped to deal with individual consumers.
The power of knowledge is priceless.
It would be nice if someone could put together a site similar to gasbuddy ( https://www.gasbuddy.com/ ) to help us find the best local prices and availability of various products. I realize it would be a ton of work and not inexpensive, but it might be worthwhile since this supply issue isn’t going away anytime soon.
My grocery store still has pretty much everything in stock like normal.
I cleaned them out on a few things for my freezer but I didn’t see one bare shelf. Once the stores in the center of town run out people are sure to head to my area and pick everything clean. But for now . . .
I would expect supply chain issues to continue as long as consumers continue to binge horde out of fear of starvation, the reality being one can live quite a long time on very little food. I’ve experimented with this the past couple years, limiting myself to five dollars per day to feed myself and the cat. Still healthy and alive.
No binge hoarding, just typical rural customary stocking of the pantry. Haven’t eaten fresh red meat in over a year. Hardly ever go to a store. Not everyone’s cuppa but as a guy who made his living in the greatest agricultural area in the country, I figured why not see how little one can live on. Interesting.
$5 a day is totally doable, we do it for less.
The real trick is to stock up with sales. The way to eat beef is to watch for close dated discounts. Also think outside the box. Aldi has a pretty decent corned beef hash for $1.85 and it’s 2 OK servings with eggs. We have that a couple of times a month.
You call it hording, I call it pre-purchasing/cost averaging.
I remember reading articles in 2020 about people in big cities in California going to other small towns and wiping out those shelves when their own stores became empty. Locals were very unhappy.
Yup. They did it here, too, awhile back.
They did that everywhere surrounding big cities.
Milwaukee burbs had a week or so of good shopping, then POW. For the TP fiasco.
Remember the hand sanitizer run? It was like the Dutch Tulip Mania for awhile…the sheep just couldn’t grasp the concept of non-corporate hand-washing.
I was in the local Winco a couple of weeks ago and talked with the young lady ordering product about the empty shelves in the produce section. Their trucks had been held up by weather – not unusual here. More interesting was that the warehouse has a huge number of products unavailable for ordering. She demonstrated using her scanner and, nope, that variety of sprinkles was not available. Still had product on the shelve but once that’s gone, there isn’t any to replace it. She said it was like that for a lot of stuff.
The fraying will start at the edges first as the companies shift materials into core products to protect those lines.
I’m as stocked on the basics + medical as I can be. I’ve just added a dehydrator so I can make jerky while I can and dried fruit off my trees to stretch my crop yields (cherries, apples, peaches, tomatoes.) Seeds are in hand and I stocked up on fertilizer. I’m increasing my garden space by 300% this year.
If Government House’s Kovid response is any indication….. This problem should only last about 5 years.
It concerned me yesterday when I first saw the #Bidenemptyshelves stuff partly pushed by a couple of conservatives I follow. I feared it might cause a panic and was surprised that wasn’t considered.
The panic is yet to come. That will happen when the larger mass of people discover that not only have the prices inflated enormously but they can’t get the food they want at any price because it isn’t available.
Then, all heck is going to break loose.
I know you’re right. It’s gonna happen. Just hoping to push it off a little longer.
We lived through this in eastern PA in 2020 with all the lockdowns. Whole aisles empty. No pasta or sauce and anything easy to cook. People were buying the $$$ imported pasta and sauce just to have something to serve for dinner. There were no generic at less than a buck and the name brand at $1-2 was wiped out.
We had a pantry and freezer so didn’t have a problem. I’ve been restocking at higher volume since then as things went on sale. People complained that their grocery bill increased in 2020-2021, mine didn’t because I was able to use my pantry to juggle things.
Pasta aisle empty here in SE Arizona. Bread inventory skimpy.
Here in the S.C. Lowcountry we are lucky to have many grocery stores just a few miles apart.
Publix had a sale on Progresso soups 2 for$3. Also Springer Mountain cooked chicken breast strips 8oz package 2 for $7,
Del Monte4, 4 oz cut fruit cups $2. Manischewitz 6 oz vegetable, split pea, and minestrone soup mixes from 84 cents to about $2.
I also purchased Wasa Rye crisp flatbread and matzo’s that were not on sale.
Harris Teeter has Campbell soup twofers, their own brand sliced cheese for about $1.50, large Fuji apples at 99 cents a pound, and good prices on bottled juices.
A pharmacist suggested purchasing ensure or boost as a supplement. So off to Sam’s club for their very good prices.
Food Lion has a good selection of fresh fruits and veggies and a small but good meat department.
Life is truly an adventure, praying for the best outcome.
Seacoast, NH
Market Basket today…NO dishwasher detergent. It’s been out for a while. Laundry detergent was very low.
The produce department looks like a bomb went off. The chilled areas on the perimeter had a few limp green onions, a few lettuce and rhubarb. Plenty of apples! The bagged greens wall of organic Olivia’s was completely empty, with a signposted.
The chip aisle was decimated. The whole display of chicken was boneless tenders and a few boneless breasts, for $3.49/lb. All in generic packaging. No brand name at all.
There was very little beef. They did have (while supply lasts) 80% ground beef for $2.99/lb. 3-5 lb. packages.
The canned chicken that we buy was out for weeks. $2/can. It’s back…for $2.29/can.
Magic Shell (for ice cream), Progresso Italian Wedding Soup, Coffeemate Italian Cream SF have all been out for weeks.
The bakery was slim pickins. And the rotisserie chicken…none. Prepared foods from the MB kitchen- none. I think the staff in those departments are all out.
Rotisserie chickens seem to have gone extinct here as well
Quercetin is made from apple peel. Apple a day keeps the Dr. away.
Central west coast of Florida here. I have seen ZERO problems.
Maybe I normally don’t buy the things affected? I buy my produce from a locally sourced market.
My experience as well. I definitely think it’s a matter of what you buy. I get most of my produce from the local organic market.
Produce not a problem in our part of SoCal. Gorgeous tomatoes. Bartlett pears, grapes. Broccoli. Really nice smaller red onions in bags. Good prices. If I were still growing tomatoes, I’d be planting them in in March.
What I’ve noticed is the freshness of produce being non existent. A bag of potatoes will go bad in under a week, same with onions, cukes. I now only buy vegetables when I know I’ll use them within a day or two. Frozen items like garlic bread, waffles and pancakes are almost always gone. Dairy and eggs can be a little iffy. Heavy cream is hard to find. Choices of most items are reduced. It’s bizarre how we allowed this to happen.
Yep. Onions & potatoes have no staying power at all. Been wondering why. Heart of Maricopa county here. Safeway stores are not well stocked – their pardner, Albertson’s seems not to have a problem. All of the other stores have at times recently had zero what I call condiment greens – parsley, cilantro, green onions – absolutely none! Closest Walmart routinely low on beans & rice for awhile now. Winco & Fry’s (Kroger) have remained well stocked on most things. Holiday turkey & ham not an issue and very little price increase.
I have been complaining about that since the Rona started, fresh produce simply does not last as long as it should. I don’t know if it has to do w/transport or something in the air, or ground, but it is frustrating. Pre-Rona things lasted for a very long time. Even the local farmer’s market stand over summer, his stuff didn’t last long at all and he was picking things the day of and/or the night before he put up his stand.
I have been trying to dig through the October, November, and December posts on how to prepare to make sure I’m getting all things covered, but can’t find them can anyone help me out. Thanks
Go through the pages of this thread alone and you’ll find lots of information. Also go to the thread “Things to Look for…”
I’ve been in FL since late November..Fernandina Beach and Ocala..no shortages but the price of steak was 40$ a pound at Harris Teeter..I did notice a large supply of frozen turkeys..Last fall I did a big online purchase of food from walmart and they were out of powdered milk and powdered eggs.
$40/pound? What kind of steak? I frequently shop at Harris Teeter the highest I have seen to date is $18.99.
Husband just got back from Publix, (West Central Florida, ) south of Tampa. No chicken, turkey or processed potatoes.
He’s heading to Costco near Bradenton to see what the situation is there.
Forgot to add, dairy shelves are almost emptied as well.
It’s the influx…. we are loaded here in Naples. Stores are still pretty stocked, some items hard to find. Oat milk creamer and cream cheese. For all the peoples here now.. our stores are doing an excellent job. Alfie Oakes has his own farms so I would imagine fresh will be available both organic and not. He’s the king of supermarketers. And, on the right side of history. Love shopping at his stores.
Someone is hoarding all the potatoes, the only question is who? My guess is the Biden Regime is hoarding most of them, just like the monoclonal antibodies. Why hoard the Potato products at stores, who knows since everyone normally eats them?
Nothing like living in the Communist ran USSA, where the commies create Crisis out of nothing for their own benefit.
To make us go through an Irish famine, cept we don’t have another country to go to like the Irish did.
In the case of my local Safeway, here in Lafayette, CA; the empty shelves … exorbitantly HIGH prices … lack of checkers … long lines … mask Nazism … 6-ft Nazism … miserable produce Dept. … and complete lack of customer service … is simply mismanagement. Incompetent management. Uncaring management. How do I know? Because the Safeway stores in the two nearest neighboring towns have no such problems.
And when I visit my daughter in Dana Pt. CA … her local Ralph’s is a SUPERSTORE by comparison. They had NO empty shelves over the holidays. Their prices are literally 25% cheaper across the board. They sold Prime Rib for $7.99/lb at Christmas … my local Safeway? $20.99/lb. The comparison between these two typical retail supermarkets between N.CA and SO. CA is truly SHOCKING.
My experience here in CA suggests the empty shelves are a result of complete mismanagement. I also have a hunch that when supplies of certain products are limited … the vendors would rather sell to someone else … not Safeway.
Safeway owned by Kroger?
Albertsons
No, Albertsons
No, Albertsons.
Ralphs is owned by Kroger.
Part of it will be CA stupid/evil green new deal truck regulations and how stores have adapted or failed to adapt to having truck capacity removed from CA.
I am in So Cal, and my local Albertson’s is now more expensive than Ralph’s (Kroger’s) for MANY items. A can of refried beans that sells for $1 elsewhere is now $2.49 at Albertson’s, and bacon is now priced like a luxury item. Although this weekend, my Albertson’s have a huge pile of nice looking fresh, loose russet potatoes for 99c/lb… best looking potatoes I’ve seen in months and lots of them. But only a limited supply of frozen fries, and no frozen hash browns or tots.
I checked out a Stater Bros today (regional chain) and their fresh chicken sections was filled with some really questionable looking half-hams (a brand I’d never heard of). A few packages of off-brand boneless chicken breasts for $5/lb, and they didn’t look great either. I’d say about 1/2 of the beef in the meat cases looked old and poor quality – more grayish than red.
Stater Bros was also very low on nearly all bacon, lunch meats and frozen potatoes. Pasta about 1/2 gone, ramen section completely cleared out – not just low like usual – I mean completely empty.
Aldi in S Indiana was well stocked today, even 1/2 & 1/2, cream cheese, frozen potatoes and the small containers of prime rib wet dog food that my little dogs love. 10lb high quality Russet potatoes $3.19, store brand potato chips are $1.69 now – up from last week’s $1.39 – which was up from the forever price of $1.15 Prices were up on some things but not all and no obvious gouging.
Frozen food cases were in good shape but there were some holes. Only things frozen I was after was their premium vanilla ice cream and frozen crinkle fries and they had both – for those that haven’t tried Aldi’s premium ice cream, you have a treat in store. $4.49 for a 48oz carton and it is the best store bought vanilla ice cream I’ve ever had. Will make you forget all about Hagan Daz and I’ve always heard there are no calories if you eat it standing up 😉
Safeway stores here in AZ are having difficulty staying stocked but not Albertsons. I only go for the deals because both store’s prices are usually double anybody else on anything. Even identical items are half price what these stores charge. I used to have cause to go to border town Safeway and they would have good prices to entice shoppers from across the line. Plus all those who come across to get their food stamp booklet at their PO box could stay and shop at Safeway and then the Red Cross bus would take them back to Mexico with their groceries.
You bring up an interesting point. As in “Atlas Shrugged,” when the residents of Galt’s Gulch warned Dagny about all the crashes and bridges falling that she’d be hearing about….this is also helped along by the lack of competence and intelligence (and basic education) in the general population.
Yes, folks, Idiocracy (or The Marching Morons, as the original short story was called) is here. And racial and sexual privilege doesn’t help, either. The best are shut out while the go-alongs get the admission and the job (just look at the lying, foolish — not all, but enough — medical profession)
To go along with that, I just read an Adam Smith quote about how with mechanization, people would lose their skills, knowledge and practice in problem solving…that when all you have to do is flip switches instead of doing the job, you lose all that. I think of it every time kids are handed a phone and a computer and told “Just look it up.” (Even finding mom in the supermarket used to teach problem solving, persistence, trial-and-error, logic, memory, directions, etc. where now they just call and say “Where are you”? And I’m not even going to mention the GPS.)
in an email this morning a friend of mine mentioned he had stocked up on things non perishable simply for the expected inflation price jump. Kind of a monetary storm prep if you will…….
I have so many cans of beans in formerly empty cabinets it’s not even funny. Rice. Lentils. Spaghetti and canned tomatoes.
If push comes to shove, my family can make it on canned goods alone until the local farm reopens in March.
Soon inflation won’t be the issue, but a complete lack of anything to buy.
And that’s the real issue… it’s bad enough being ridiculously expensive… but being completely gone – that is certain to start getting the attention of the masses.
Bloomington MN.
Wet cat food almost doesn’t exist over the last month or so. Minimal selections if any on shelves.
Processed potato products have been short to gone for a long time. Shipments arrive and if you happen to be in time you might get some before they disappear in a day or so.
Most other things are in stock as far as I can tell.
Sundance, some of these things like potato products, chicken tenders, ramen soup, peanut butter etc. are the things that people tend to grab because they don’t know how to cook. If these shortages you predict come true, some of it is the fault of buyers.
Adding to your last paragraph . . . . I also suspect that many of today’s children are finicky eaters and their main foods are “chicken tenders, ramen soup, peanut butter, etc.”
I haven’t been to Taco Bell, McDonalds, or other fast food places in a while. I bet their prices are making it difficult for parents who are accustomed to feeding themselves and their children on fast food.
Aldis chicken tenders, sliced mushrooms and some Marsala = very quick, delicious Chicken Marsala…
One of ours is closed “inside” — only the drive-through’s open– can’t get employees in this small town. Take a drive, and all you see is “help wanted” signs.
I was thinking that. I thought ramen soup was what college kids survived on along with boxed Kraft mac and cheese. And a microwave. Aldis has very good chicken. And their ground beef is good. We like it lean.
Potatoes and a box grater will give you as many hash browns as you can eat…
We have all seen the Soviet era grocery shelves. That is where we are headed,
I forgot to post this when the Jan 15 entry about the vaxxed trucking industry got into effect and should have done so. BUT the logistics of delivering products (food) will be altered to accommodate demand. It has always been so. If Canada shuts off supply chains, commerce will move immediately to intra-state delivery. Canada will be an after thought. Trade lines between countries were done to benefit other countries..not the US. Once jan 15 (which I think won’t happen due to trade pressure except with the Chinese) trade between states will become the norm like it was pre-treaty. This I think will be a good thing. We buy products from other states not other countries. There are huge opportunities in that not to mention a relief from the squirrely suspect of bad products that come across where we can’t do anything about it. Case is point is the pork industry. China needs us. We don’t need them. It only takes a few days to rectify supply chain from global to US based. So have heart. You may not buy Smithfield pork but you can buy local free range pork (which is better for you) from your local farmers (CSA) and magnificant beef and chicken products. It will take a while to gear up but it will work out better in the long run.
Is that assuming the Brandon Dumpster Fire will actually do the right thing, instead of giving away the farm?
?w=960
My job is impacted; it depends on consumer spending. Was very bad, then picked up in December, and now it just dropped quickly. Company is woke; probably think white supremacists shutting down supplies..haha.
Southeast Michigan Kroger experience: Bulk water, especially purified, is hard to find and twice as expensive. Usually two or three rows are left empty at the far corner of the the store so you won’t notice. Ends of rows and along the middle of wide isles are empty where they used to put specials. Yellow super saver prices, when you find them, are not super or savers. Milk is always sold out by the end of the day even at 75% or 80% increases. I bought some berries from a different store and the package said, “Packaged in EU Country”. I’ve never seen that before. They always came from Chili this time of year.
We used to drink powdered milk in the 70’s thanks to Carter. Brought back memories when you mentioned it here.
You’re correct about this being the beginning. We’re entering the first crop season. I just heard an NPR report about used farm equipment selling for more than when they were new and small farmers being priced out of the market. That’s on top of seed and fertilizer prices tripling and corn being gobbled up for gasoline rather than food or feed.
My daughter lives in Austin, and today they had no lemons or carrots at her HEB. I told her to look for a local co-op or farmer.
I’ve been warning all my family about this thanks to CTH. I told her it’s only going to get worse.
A bit NW, the SAM’S and Walmart Lakeline facilities fully stocked today including lemons, limes and veggies. 🙂
In case it helps– I break eggs and whisk, pour into muffin pans or ice cube trays, freeze, then put the frozen egg cubes into a freezer bag and keep frozen. They will keep for a year. Thaw in fridge before using.
Thanks! Never knew that.👍🏻👍🏻
Bob! Thank you! My hens out-lay my consumption. I never heard of this method for freezing raw eggs at home.
Central NC near the Virginia line: shopping this morning at Food Lion; not only did I get everything on my list, I saw no empty shelves and the prices were actually less than they have been. Totally different from what I expected after a friend said the shelves were bare last Friday.
In Los Angeles. I have seen a massive uptick in food prices for the last 2 years. The last 2 months have lead to larger and larger amounts of foodstuffs being poorly stocked. Giant milk cases have been empty for over a month. Certain yogurt is hard to find. The kids probiotic drinks are nearly impossible to get. The fruit options have been light and are often molding/rotting. Veggies options have been a lot weaker. No asparagus today after no broccoli two days ago. The quality is down. Cheese is more limited. Frozen breakfast items are becoming harder to find. Frozen pizza and frozen potato items are a lot lighter. Chicken nuggets have been hard to find. You have to time it right. Bread items like Hawaiian bread has been harder and harder to find. Hummus is not being replenished. The one item that I have not seen much issue with is chips. There have been no issues with chips lol.
Side note. Went to the glorious state of Florida (orlando and sarasota) for Christmas and they had no gatorade type drinks. I was told that it has been going on for months. They have the liquid but no bottles.
Hannaford today in western Maine.Pretty well stocked as they have been. Ptoduce, meat & poultry, dairy, chips, booze…no issues. Only slim areas were cookies & crackers (no saltines at all),paper towels, and all varieties of Goya dried beans. Goya canned items, no problemo. Picked up 4, whole chickens at .89 a lb.
I noticed with some st9res a whole slew of frozen turkeys and if it isnt turkey its the bigger hams, small hams and ham steaks though are pricey
Anyone else remember the little semi-insulated, metal “Dairy Box” that you left on the front stoop, porch, etc. for “The Milkman” to deliver your milk in Glass Bottles?
When you were done w/ the milk, you rinsed the bottle out and put it back in Metal Box for the Milkman to pick up and take back for re-use.
There are some dairies that have re-adopted that model. Maybe more should?
It would take care of a couple of problems, for sure.
Like the plastic bottles fr/ China, keeps dairy farms and production more local, etc.
In these days of “order food online”, dairy delivery could probably make a comeback.
One of my uncles was a Milkman – down in FL., of all places. They must have had *super* insulated Milk Boxes down here! Much hardier than the ones we had up North.
Waves hand!👋🏻 I remember it well because one morning (I was about 7 or 8 yrs. old), I opened the front door’s screen door (which swung outward) and knocked over the glass milk bottles. Milk all over the porch.😬
In our neighborhood, many homes had boxes for milk delivery built into the wall of the house in the kitchen area. A door on the outside, another on the inside…
Yep! This house built in 1966 has a mail chute, a clothes chute, and a milk chute. What cool luxuries!
The milk chute houses the kids 2017 time capsule at the moment.
what can the average citizen do to alleviate the supply chain crisis? we are always saying we don’t want government control so let’s do something about it ourselves.
For people w/ yards, growing gardens and raising chickens for eggs.
People who are doing that now usually just give their excess away free to neighbors and friends.
But really, if things get very bad, they could/should (?) sell or barter the stuff.
In my sister’s area, different neighbors grow different crops and they all swop their excess with each other.
i HAVE PUT IN lots of bags of nuts and dried fruit. If the shtf, my wife and i will rely on that. we have a lot of pasta and rice, as well. if gas/electric holds up, we’ll cook that. probably should get a water purification system (about $300.00).
Northeastern Louisiana: I went to Target this afternoon. Most shelves were full and well stocked (even wet dog & cat food). The only bare spots I saw were amongst the paper towels, cereals and the bread goods.
#1 has started. https://www.dailywire.com/news/potato-shortage-leads-to-global-shortage-of-french-fries-potato-chips?utm_campaign=dw_newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_source=housefile&utm_content=non_member
Just back from Costco in the Williamette Valley.
Milk was 6.06$ and there was not much of it. (2 gallons)
There may be mutiny.
Oh and a case of Charmin 23.99. Dog food that is normally 26$ was 33.78.
I understand that this is the tip of the iceberg and not the worst of what is coming but if these prices don’t wake people up nothing will. Well, maybe when there is none.
They’ll buy whatever excuse is offered. I hear people saying “Well, it snowed,” as if we always have problems in the winter. Huh?
My San Antonio HEB Plus had pretty good stock today. Frozen potatoes mostly gone, some milk sparse, only HEB brand cream cheese, less selection of soups, pasta was sparse, and produce had been rearranged (to cover for a few missing items?) I was thankful and pleased. (Except for the prices!😮) Since their headquarters are here and they sell TONS of their own brand, I think we will fare better than some. They purchase from lots of south Texas farms as well as Mexico. I did hear that some of their trucks were without parts and thus out of commission.
Here’s what I noticed: I keep a pretty well-stocked pantry and I practice stock rotation each time I add inventory. What I have noticed with multiple products over the past month, is that the ‘Expiration / Use By’ dates on many things I have just recently purchased are actually closer (in time) than identical products that I’ve bought 2 – 4 months ago. All purchased from the same places. The more recently-purchased items are much closer to the end of their shelf life at the time of purchase. They end up going onto my shelves as first to be used because of this. Anybody else seeing this?
The manager of the local Walmart is a good friend of mine. We had a discussion about the empty shelves a few weeks ago. He said that the reason is due to a lack of help/employees. Trucks are waiting outside the store to be unloaded and the store doesn’t have enough help to unload and restock the shelves.
That is the case here too.
The help they do have they are not doing much to keep (Local Fred’s).
Jason, I have read in many places that this stocking problem is the main cause of the empty shelves. The modern markets don’t have storage space onsite. It’s not a matter of “going to the back room” anymore. They all seem to have Help Wanted signs as well.
In my opinion, Horizon brand dairy products are still misrepresenting themselves and their milk products. How can milk that has been ULTRA-Pasteurized still be classified as “organic” and/or “grass fed”????? That is the biggest misnomer I’ve ever witnessed. Out and out lies.
Batch pasteurized Kalona milk products are about as close as we’re ever going to be able to get, anymore, to real raw milk – – like we used to drink it when I was a kid on the farm/ranch. Just 3 years ago we used to buy raw milk from a local dairy farmer in our area, but the idjuts in the SD Legislature just couldn’t STAND the idea of someone getting real food, so they shut down all the milk producers in the area who were small and selling raw dairy.
The food supply no matter what you’re discussing is now controlled by morons who don’t know the first thing about real food. Like AOC, for instance, thinks you just “go to the store and buy stuff” when you’re home cupboards are getting empty, she has absolutely not the first friggin’ clue how that food GETS to the supermarkets. Do you suppose she knows what a root cellar is? Ha, yeah, right.
The other day my organic store was out of my usual half and half – glass bottle no less. Hubby went to the supermarket could not find a single brand that was not ultra pasteurized. I drank my coffee black until I could get back to the organic market.
I can get raw milk cheese at the store but not raw milk.
Ever hear that tape of AOC visiting an urban garden and exclaiming “Oh, my God! Look at that, Oh my God—it’s lettuce! Growing right there in the dirt!”
(This is not from the Babylon Bee. True story.)
There isn’t any Organic Brown Rice anywhere except for California Lundberg Rice at twice the cost.
Went to Walm tonight and was stunned at the empty shelves everywhere. No canned cat food anywhere, only dog food. Row after row of groceries empty. This is in Mount Dora, outside Orlando.
I am so intrigued by the disparity of goods across our great grocery expanse.
I was compelled to visit my Publix Greer in upstate South Carolina.
started by the pharmacy, all over the counter meds were very well stocked.
proceeded to the produce section which was absolutely beautiful stocked with fresh fruits and vegetables all in fantastic condition. The only thing lacking was the bananas grapes and berries.
potatoes were in abundance fresh and in bags and all in excellent condition.
so now I’m seeing this great disparity between my grocery store and the ones that are commenting on here.
got tons of salad orange juice, bread aisle fully stocked. Wander on down towards Dairi O very well stocked.
Juice aisle got everything I needed carrot juice V-8 lemon juice Cran apple etc. in plenty of supply
next Aisle ,cereals pretty well stocked ,nothing crazy
ok So I’m thinking I got everything I need no reason to panic here because seems like supplies are coming.
but I’ll just wander over to the meat section.
WHOA. No chicken, just a few legs,
No Turkey in any form..That’s supposed the last remaining
meat!
However, lots of beef! Steaks, roasts.stewbeef ..I got the last three packs of ground beef.
Sundance, can you give some more insight as to why upstate South Carolina is flooded with potatoes and beautiful produce while so many of you are desperate!
oh forgot the paper aisle was pathetic, but I snagged a pack of cottonelle😀
Midlands, South Carolina here. Seeing pretty much the same as you. However, went to Food Lion around 4;30 pm today and there was very little meat or chicken. No turkeys. Even the bacon and sausages were low.
Took notice of what another Treeper here stated – and agreed that the store’s shelves were definitely not as deep. Thought about it – maybe I just never noticed??? But no-canned goods were only about 5 deep – that’s NOT how it used to be.
Very little pasta and rice. NO frozen potatoes. Dog food – very plentiful. No cream cheese. Several other dairy items were cleared as well. Paper goods very low.
We began stocking up in Fall. Went to military base commissary and spent $1200+ on meats and non-perishables. Repackaged the meat by vacuum-sealing for longevity. Spent thousands more over the past months – one spare bedroom looks like a mini-mart. Even purchased a few of those 30-day meal buckets as well as survival-prepped.
Try warning friends and co-workers and they just look at me like I’m that “crazy doomsday preppier!” Oh well…better safe than sorry!!