3 ms·

Out of interest, where were you? Just to flesh out my experience. In the UK we defiantly had some things missing from shelves, but it would be running out of s

by Balero 4y ago

Out of interest, where were you? Just to flesh out my experience. In the UK we defiantly had some things missing from shelves, but it would be running out of strawberry cereal bars and having to have raspberry ones instead. Aside from some short term (about 2 weeks) issues with everyone buying all the loo roll, there wasn't anything that couldn't be replaced.

codefreeordie 4y ago
Not where you would think: so cal. Now, it wasn't this bad everywhere in so cal -- for whatever reason certain areas got way more wrecked than others. I was still able to get food during this whole time, just not by going to a market within 15 miles of my house. This was clearly a distribution shortage not a real food shortage. I drove about 35 miles to my parents' neighborhood and everything looked picked-over, but there was plenty of food. For example, I wanted pasta and sauce. I found pasta and sauce, but had to get a weird pasta shape and a more unusual/fancy sauce to find something in stock. That trip, I found some version of everything I needed, except that rice and flour could not be had. I wanted some produce, and I found some. Lettuce was gone, so were bananas and oranges, but I was able to get enough things that I felt comfortable I would still eat. Meat was a bigger challenge -- the regular market had only hamburger and bacon left (but the Costco in my parents' neighborhood still had plenty of all of the expensive meats and were only out-of-stock on the affordable stuff. If you wanted $20+/lb prime ribeye steaks, for example, they had plenty. Not huge mountains like usual, but plenty) And restaurants (that didn't close) were fine at that time even in my neighborhood (they ran low at a different time, when local markets were fine). My local pizza place did a bigger business selling ziploc bags of flour, plastic beverage cups of milk and cream, and to-go containers full of eggs and butter than they did pizza delivery for a solid two months. (and commercial tissues and TP by the roll). These ingredients were all readily obtainable in commercial-sized units from commercial suppliers. Still, I produced some (really bad) footage of completely empty markets, and, as a pretty rich guy in a pretty rich area, felt worried about whether I would be able to keep eating for the first time in my life. (I'll never again not keep at least a few shelves' worth of food in the house at all times)

by Balero 4y ago

codefreeordie 4y ago

Not where you would think: so cal. Now, it wasn't this bad everywhere in so cal -- for whatever reason certain areas got way more wrecked than others. I was still able to get food during this whole time, just not by going to a market within 15 miles of my house. This was clearly a distribution shortage not a real food shortage. I drove about 35 miles to my parents' neighborhood and everything looked picked-over, but there was plenty of food. For example, I wanted pasta and sauce. I found pasta and sauce, but had to get a weird pasta shape and a more unusual/fancy sauce to find something in stock. That trip, I found some version of everything I needed, except that rice and flour could not be had. I wanted some produce, and I found some. Lettuce was gone, so were bananas and oranges, but I was able to get enough things that I felt comfortable I would still eat. Meat was a bigger challenge -- the regular market had only hamburger and bacon left (but the Costco in my parents' neighborhood still had plenty of all of the expensive meats and were only out-of-stock on the affordable stuff. If you wanted $20+/lb prime ribeye steaks, for example, they had plenty. Not huge mountains like usual, but plenty) And restaurants (that didn't close) were fine at that time even in my neighborhood (they ran low at a different time, when local markets were fine). My local pizza place did a bigger business selling ziploc bags of flour, plastic beverage cups of milk and cream, and to-go containers full of eggs and butter than they did pizza delivery for a solid two months. (and commercial tissues and TP by the roll). These ingredients were all readily obtainable in commercial-sized units from commercial suppliers. Still, I produced some (really bad) footage of completely empty markets, and, as a pretty rich guy in a pretty rich area, felt worried about whether I would be able to keep eating for the first time in my life. (I'll never again not keep at least a few shelves' worth of food in the house at all times)