Grocery store shelves are being emptied all over the country...

People who exploit animals paying a little extra to ease their guilty consciences.....

 

The local convenience stores around here have eggs for about ,25-.30 over the supermarkets, which have them from $1.95 to $2.45, depending on the size. Normal eggs work for me.

 

This is $8 Canadian, so maybe $5 USD?

That's all they had left, any port in a storm, as @bisco says.

And again, this is at 7 am... the poor saps that come in later are SOL.

They come in a clear plastic tray, with an extra layer you have to flip up, and a nutrition label that says they provide 100% of this, 80% of that.

 

How do you know the egg truck doesn't show up at 10:30? It kind of doesn't matter when they let the seniors in, there's almost guaranteed to be something that hasn't been restocked in 22 hours.

 

we got our order tonight. no meat, no cleaning products (i guess there's a run on lysol), and a bunch of miscellaneous items. still, plenty to eat. for now.

 

Stores around here getting close to normal stock. Biggest problem for me is QT is the only thing open 24 hours. 7-11, Wally World...they all shut down at night now. Anyone who ever work 3rd shift knows what I mean.

 

US$5.67 today. Considering transport distances and possible taxing differences, that isn't a bad markup compared to slightly under US$5 close to the source.

Then there are rural areas where the supply trucks come just once or twice a week, so restocking takes much longer.

In the early stages of the panic buying, Sis (doing work / elder care shift in rural area) inquired with the store and learned that many items on the panic list du jour simply were not making it to said town at all, but were being taken off the trucks at towns closer to the distribution hubs. The trucks were arriving without many ordered items.

 

Eggs just went up, a lot! Chicken and pork are difficult to get, and only standard cuts are available of many meats in general. Several fringe SKU's (Stock Keeping Units) of meat are just unavailable to order here in the Midwest currently. We get stock in every day of most items, it just isn't the numbers we'd like to be receiving after we order it the day before. Those with very specific shopping lists just need to get a bit creative, that's all. Supply in general is good, for the most part. Shelves look full after the morning shift does their job. I'm very proud of the way everyone at work and most every customer are adapting to this new, and hopefully temporary, normal.

 

Well, our first signs of life out of a casino here in Laughlin. One of our smallest and oldest casinos, the Regency, reopened the restaurant inside for phone in orders only. The place is set up well for them to cook and then deliver orders to cars in the driveway outside the front door. It's not any different than what a lot of restaurants have been doing all along but it IS the first step by any of the casinos. I suspect some of the other casino restaurants may try to follow the leader soon.

 

the more restaurants open, the less logistal nightmares the food suppliers have.

boston is allowing restaurants to sell groceries now.

 

Yeah, we have been hearing the shortage of meat for a week or so now. We've had hard time finding chicken meat, but not pork. It may change soon. We are well stocked for beef. Right now we have no more room in our deep freezer. Hope by the time we are out of our meat stock, the things are back to normal...

 

I broke down and went to the Smith's (Kroger) across the bridge in Mohave Valley, AZ yesterday. A lot of things are still in short supply but almost all of the "Limit One" and "Limit Two" per customer signs are gone.

Most disturbing were the shoppers. They have things well posted for one-way traffic on the aisles. I was amazed at the number of people conscientiously looking at the signs and then walking the wrong way, finding it too big of an inconvenience to walk a few extra steps up the next aisle and coming back down to get that bag of potato chips or quart of ice cream.

The parking lot was full of California license plates, too. The clerk was telling me most of the out of state customers are telling her they just decided to take vacations. Low gas prices and the fact that the Coast Guard hasn't shut down the Colorado River or lakes like Havasu and Mohave to recreational use for people with their own boats and jet skis were too good to pass up. They were also tired of being cooped up at home and facing shortages there so they may as well come out here and play, causing worse shortages here. In other words, they are so self-centered they don't give a darn about their fellow man.

She also told me that they are seeing quite a few local "regulars" still coming in two or three times in a single day just to pick up one or two items. They still don't take this thing seriously despite the fact that infection numbers and deaths are rising. Some cases are linked to other victimes but others are new cases people are getting from stores, gas stations, visiitors, etc. We had our first death in Bullhead City yesterday and there have been three in Havasu. Those are only the locals; the out of state infections are counted as victims in their home states. One local hospital is down to having only one ICU bed available now and the larger one is down to about 5.

Tests are still in short supply. Less than 1% of the people have been tested.

Still no reported cases here on the Laughlin side of the river but we know it's just a matter of time. Close to 20% of our population is over age 65 so we're probably going to see some deaths, too.

I'm sure glad we like our house and have the solar panels. Looks like we'll be spending a lot of time in it running the air conditioner over the next year (at least).

 

Yeah, non-compliance is going to back fire soon or later. As I am sure that we are going to get second and third waves later this year or next, we better get use to taking a long staycation.

I did my third weekly Walmart Grocery pick-up today. Most of staple perishable food items like fresh veggies, fruit and milk can be ordered. But all fresh meats seem to be in short supply now. Since their pick-up time slot is only avilalabe 5 days after the order day, I have been placing the new order immediately after the pick-up, and selecting the pick-up day and time to one week from the last pick-up day. Good thing is that the order stays editable until 1:15am of the scheduled pick-up day. We just keep adding items as they become needed or initially unavailable item becomes available, or delete the item no longer needed throughout the week up until the night before the scheduled pick-up day. The system works very well, and saves time to do grocery shopping. However, today we had a few poor quality produce items that my wife would not approve. I could not get the refund processed on-line for some reason, so I had to call their call center number and wait 18 min to talk to the customer assistant. Still got a full refunds without returning items. I don't know if we will stay with the system for all grocery needs once the store is open unrestricted again, but for sure to use the on-line order and curb side pick-up for certain items.

 

dil went last night, no meat, ketchup, pancake mix or vanilla pudding. could be worse i guess, might get worse.

 

Anybody getting deliveries entertain reverting shopping in person, at longish intervals?

I considered delivery, but seems like limited benefit, more expensive, frustrating. I've been going in about once every two weeks (more like 17~18 days), bright and early, for senior's hour. A mid-size chain store, not at all crowded.

 

I'm going to give it a shot, ordering for pick-up or delivery is pretty much impossible now.

 

We don't have delivery service here, except what we can order through Amazon.com. We haven't gone to inside a grocery store in person over a month now, but have been to a local meat market in person. DW wants to go to a warehouse store for a bulk buy items, but that's a couple hours away in a bigger more populous, thus more dangerous city. We will wait for that visit as long as we can. I have to take my wife SUV for inspection next week. I am not sure how the non-contact service is going to work.

If I exclude my family in our household, I have seen only a handful of people (real not on virtual meeting) in last 45 days since I started working from home.

 

Especially when so much stuff is out-of-stock and you need to either skip it or substitute, I'd much rather shop in person. If you're trying to get ingredients for a meal, a few missing items may sink the plan, and then you have to shift to something else on the fly, shop for something else. The mechanics of doing this remotely, someone going around the store doing your shopping, are impossible.

But yeah, stretch the interval, improve the odds.

 

If I can, I would try shortening my exposure inside of the store. If I have to wait in line to get inside of the store, I will skip the store altogether. The "line" means the store is at max capacity allowed for the customer density. Having a list of item to buy is also good. Just snatch what you want/need, slip through the self-serve check out, and run back into the safety of my own car.