No shortages?

A little trip to a town south of Edmonton/ north of Red Deer found the shelves fully stocked in everything but flour. Flour was in stock, but only one kind. Bulk Barn, full stock of any type of flour you could want, and types you never heard of.

Out of curiosity since you seem to be an avid bulkbarn shopper, what are the prices like? There’s nothing on their website. Would 5Kg of flour turn out to be a similar cost as buying one in grocery store?

HP, cant comment on flour as I never considered buying it there. I all ways ( or usually) Buy in 10 kg bags usually from Costco or Superstore/Food For less, just because I would need to fill who knows how many small bags to get to 5 or 10 kgs in quantity from Bulk Barn. As to pricing, in the before time (before 2-3 months ago) regular pricing at Bulk Barn was often 10- 20 % more than elsewhere. I usually just stuck my head in the door when in the city and bought there on sale items, and they often had really good loss leader sales, 30 sometimes 50 % off.
Here is the price list from my last trip.

Can I find each item cheaper elsewhere? yes. But I cant get it packaged in the quantity I want when I want it, all in one place?, that has value to me, and the price isn't breaking my leg. There are no sales on now, that I have seen, and I think there prices have moved upwards as I suspect operating costs have risen. I notice a staff increase now.

Thank you! Gives an idea for comparison purposes.

Did an impromptu grocery trip in Edmonton yesterday to pick up milk and thought of topping up our current supplies. Baking aisle was more or less barren with the exception of Baking Soda. No yeast, a few bags of flour and sugar, few packages of chocolate chips left...

There’s got to be some serious baking going on.

As expected, the meat plants are and will continue to struggle and the same will occur with any and all the related links in the chains. If you listen to the news, you would think the only news is about old age homes and price of oil. Lots of other things breaking down or on the edge. Besides the production line issues and they are very real, we will have more and more people unable to even afford to buy what’s on the shelves. Which as we know, will have trickle down effects. If farmers don’t plant this spring, then what?

We have had half our orders come up short. Sometimes almost in half. Be it meat, vinegar, cans of beets, .....

As money becomes more of an issue, it will be interesting to see what people will buy if pasta, rice.... are all in short supply and meat prices increase! Lots of dynamics involved in shortages, high unemployment, reduced production and inflation.

According to some and I can easily see it, the second and third wave will be worse with deaths. If this occurs, then I can easily see ration book concepts coming into play this fall.

Shame people didn’t do what they were told to do for past few decades! Imagine if we had only locked down all our borders in January. We would be riding high, safe, healthy and prosperous

We place one order for groceries a month for the last 3 months. We don’t order much, mostly “luxury” stuff. None of our orders have been complete.

Most of my family works in transport/ brokerage/ import. The office workers and truck drivers are getting sick, offices have been closed and reduced staff working from home when possible.
Suppliers are running low on stock, many meat plants are shut down.
I have local farmers who are discussing the worth of planting.
Early crops are rotting in fields due to a lack of labour.

If you’re watching retail shelves for shortages, you’re no better off than joe blow. Pay attention to the supply chain if you have contacts there, you’ll see it much sooner.
It may not be critical atm but expect a reduction in available goods.
My 2 cents.

Was in a Grocery Store the other day Paper Goods, Flour and Hand Sanitizer are finally starting to reappear on store shelves. So some aspects the supply chain are recovering.

Items like liquid hand soap and Lysol related cleaning products are still almost non-existent.

We are finding tons of shortages at Walmart and other food stores, ordered turkey breasts and they substituted for sliced turkey, so more expensive and less of it, can’t get large box of soda crackers, just small ( yes I know, not important) but I mention it to demonstrate impact to production chain. Some canned goods, and of course limits on things including meds. Fine because of preps we had before so now it’s being maintained.

For me, I am finding a fair amount of shortages in this or that, smaller bags, substituted products...

While I was in decent shape, I REALLY am big time ticked at myself for now having more.
Especially in seeds! One thing is certain, that ain’t happening again!

Big note on meds. People need to pay attention to any substitutes meds they are getting and not mix up,what they are taking, be it in dosage or brand names that sound the same or completely different. I have heart meds that have changed three times in past two months so everyone needs to really pay attention to this.

Its interesting that you are finding shortages, I really cant say the same here. Flour choices are still limited, yeast in short supply, and powdered milk is hit and miss at the big box stores. Once the stores put limits on buying quantities availability became better, even the TP aisle is fully stocked now. Meat prices are sure going up though.

It truly appears to be a hodgepodge in who has what. Yeast was near impossible to find, then I walk into a store and I could have but didn’t, grab twenty pounds!

We are trying to do curbside pickup so don’t wonder about seeing what else is there, so maybe that is part of my problem! But brands and quantities we want are seldom fulfilled

add on to my earlier post. went out to china tire and lineup was so bad i didn't bother. local hardware store had almost no seeds left, copper piping / fitting section was thin. TSC was missing a lot of automotive engine treatment and cleaning supplies and again plumbing items, again almost no seeds left.

Glad i topped up engine de greasing and various car maintenance treatments in Jan and Feb. will make sure i add when i get a chance because if this little event is eclipsed by 2nd and 3rd wave, things will look pretty thin to vaporous come this fall and next spring.

just a thought but if cases ramp back up this fall and are worse, i wonder if actual food.. rations will be implemented?

all the baloney from talking heads and politicians who are either lying or haven't a true clue said don't worry about food, flour ( I remember a farmer saying its produced here in Canada so no worries, what he didn't clue into was manufacturing...process / chain and people being sick )..., well for anyone in the loop or thinking a bit, it was to be charitable, a not very well thought out statement to make.

So to avoid true shortages next fall, i can see this being implemented?

buckle up for the ride

So far locally, we are still seeing limited numbers (aka rationing) on things, a number of sale items now require you use the store card so they can be sure you are keeping to the limit and not coming back another day etc. A lot of local sale items are often missing and they will no longer allow you to do a hold to fill it.. instead its right on the paperwork.. what the store has only..

the other thing interesting of note to me is that while the shelves are rarely empty, there is less selection and a lot of spread to cover the space.. I can see it.. not that we go out that much to be honest.

from the ground up.. so many things are coming together that WILL show up in the supply chain at a later point.. in a number of ways.. we are working around them, ordering directly from the farmers around us, stockpiling on things that I see being harder to get in the next while, planning around the required things, stepping outside the stores for all ground flours, moving to a custom mill, moving outside the stores for all meats, eggs, our own milk (and increase that area) and increasing our food production, both gardens, put up, seed production, hay production and went in a co-buy in on bringing in pallets for canning jars and canning lids in bulk.. 50 cases of 12 per pallet and we hauled in a couple pallets worth for my "working" crew

The weakness area at the moment is wood.. normally I have a good supply of extra put up but the major work we did, took up both our stockpile. I am going to have to put together a big order and have it delivered to the farm..

O and I want a battery run chainsaw.. a couple friends have them and I adore the fact that no one hears you cutting. you can take down tree's, prep your cords and more without a sound that will carry!

Farmgal... Question on battery chainsaw.

I can fell, de limb and cut up a large portion of a 1.4 foot maple on a tank of gas on my husky 455. Can this be done on one battery charge? Have looked at them for some time but never can get a comparison on what a battery can do. Those batteries are not cheap and I can’t see myself buying 4-6 to do a moderate days work Of felling and completely bucking up four such trees. I look at how fast my battery powered desalts drain and not sure the technology is up to to a serious task. Love the idea of no fumes and rattle when not in use but needs to chew through the trees.

We cut down 15 trees, cut into sections and some clean up and we went close to 2 hours and we almost used one battery, he had a back up charged battery but we never needed it.. I can ask him as he is using it to put up his winter woods supply but from what I could see, yes I think it would

He was smart waited till they went on sale, cheap enough that he got two saws, two batteries.. only thing it needs to sharpening and chain oil.. just loved it..