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Monday, March 16, 2020

US Food Industry Scrambles To Resupply Stores Amid Apocalyptic Surge In Demand

As coronavirus spreads throughout the United States, millions of panicked Americans have been hoarding everything from canned food to absurd amounts of toilet paper. Images of empty store shelves are compounding the situation, as worries over shortages amid a potential quarantine have added to the surge in purchases.

According to the nation's largest retailers, meat producers and dairy farmers however, there's plenty of food in the country; the problem is that the supply chain wasn't designed to handle this type of nation-wide surge in purchases and is now scrambling to catch up, reports the New York Times.

Industries that are calibrated to supply consumers with just enough of what they need on a given day cannot keep up with a nationwide surge of relentless shopping fueled in large part by fear. -NYT

As distributors and retailers struggle to restock shelves with a sudden demand for canned soup and oat milk, industry officials insist that these are temporary problems.

"There is food being produced. There is food in warehouses," said North American Meat Institute CEO, Julie Anna Potts. "There is plenty of food in the country."

Costco COO Ron Vachris said in a Saturday interview "Our stores are getting stocked every day," adding "Transportation is functioning, our suppliers are working around the clock and the flow of goods is strong."

Notably, hot dog orders at Costco and Walmart have increased by as much as 300% according to meat suppliers - with some hot dog plants adding Saturday and Sunday shifts, and are shipping Memorial Day stockpiles to meet the surge in demand. Hot dog makers say they have a year's supply of ingredients such as garlic, according to the report.

Meanwhile, the National Chicken Council says they aren't seeing any disruptions in production - and that "ample surplus supplies of chicken" are currently in cold storage - 950 million pounds worth, according to government data.

None of this matters to shoppers facing empty shelves right now, however.

The panicky buying is testing the food system’s capacity in the near term. Over the past few weeks, sales of rice have increased more than 50 percent, according to data from the research firm Nielsen. Canned meat is up more than 40 percent. And sales of other essentials like beans, pasta, peanut butter and bottled water have also risen substantially, with a sharp spike this month. Kroger told its suppliers that demand had surged 30 percent across all categories in recent days. (For comparison, the company’s sales for all of last year rose about 2 percent.) -NYT

Another factor in helping to restock store shelves is shifting the food supply from closed restaurants, school cafeterias and college campuses.

"The food is there. It’s just going into different spots," according to FreshDirect CEO David McInerney. "Cruise ships are not using up all of the avocados. We have a giant surge of avocados."

The hoarding began around two weeks ago. According to the Times, shortages in hand sanitizers and wipes "set off a wave of panic buying that spread in recent days to include bread, canned goods, milk and frozen food." Perhaps a more plausible explanation is that the reality of a potentially protracted home-quarantine combined with people who don't want to shop at a store with aerosolized, three-hour hang-time coronavirus in the aisles has driven Americans to stock up before it hits en masse.

Ramping up

Despite there being 'enough food' - there are logistical issues to increasing production, such as the 50-days or longer it takes for chickens to go from egg to mature bird to store shelves.

For some chicken suppliers, the process takes even longer, depending on the type of bird.

Across the industry, “you’re talking about 50 days to get to a customer,” said Matthew Wadiak, who runs Cooks Venture, a chicken supplier based in Arkansas and Oklahoma. “Fifty days ago, we didn’t know this was even on the horizon. There was essentially no way to plan for it.”

...

"It’s clear that the modern supply chain, for all its efficiency and speed, is not equipped to deal with this kind of surge." -NYT

Amazon's algorithms, for example, have been designed to provide near-perfect estimations of exactly how much inventory warehouses or particular stores must keep on hand during a typical week - but they're unable to cope with this type of exogenous event leading to bare shelves in such a short period of time.

"When the shelf is emptied in the course of 24 hours and the safety stock was built intent upon protecting a week or two of demand, you get this tremendous dislocation," said Columbia Business School director of retail studies Mark Cohen.

"The trouble is that the hoarding hasn’t abated. We’re just seeing the very beginning of this kind of behavior," he added. "The question is: How long will it take for industry to catch up?"

crediblock.com

Oregon Police: 'Don't Call 911 Just Because You Ran Out Of Toilet Paper'

From Zero Hedge:

In an almost hard to believe story which proves people are taking the "shit hit the fan" description of the current state of things way too literally, an Oregon police department had to warn people in a public announcement against calling 911 because they were out of toilet paper.

"It’s hard to believe that we even have to post this," police in Newport, Oregon stated in an official Facebook message. "Do not call 9-1-1 just because you ran out of toilet paper. You will survive without our assistance."

The national phenomena of panic-buying toilet paper is the one thing in all of this that makes least sense, unless perhaps given that markets are in nose-dive — and who knows if currencies could be next down the line — people are viewing TP as the next currency of the post-apocalypse, giving new meaning to 'dirty money'.

The Newport police statement urged people to "Be resourceful. Be patient. There is a TP shortage. This too shall pass. Just don’t call 9-1-1. We cannot bring you toilet paper." And it went so far as to offer ideas as using grocery store receipts, torn magazine pages, cotton balls, and even corn cobs as apparently the Mayans and some among Colonial Americans did.

"History offers many other options for you in your time of need if you cannot find a roll of your favorite soft, ultra plush two-ply citrus scented tissue," the department wrote.

The local police department posted the below after apparently receiving multiple 911 calls:

Meanwhile, it seems as much of the nation settles in for a possibly lengthy self-isolation mode, Facebook and other social media sites have been inundated by a deluge of toilet paper hording memes.

This is so much so that mainstream media has begun reporting on the accompanying meme craze, noting that their consistent message is: "Go urgently and buy toilet paper. Don't worry how much you need, buy as much as you can."

Of course, given stores like HEB and Kroger have begun cutting back on hours, and as more cities declare states of emergencies, with San Francisco and the Bay area issuing a 'shelter in place' emergency on Monday, we could soon see a situation where the very places selling the valuable TP simply shut down.

And then those who didn't stock up could be shit out of luck.

www.crediblock.com

BREAKING: Federal government to control and oversee grocery distribution with govt / private sector partnerships: Wal-Mart, Costco, Target, Kroger, top grocery chains to be deemed “critical infrastructure” … National Guard to protect key distribution points

From NaturalNews:

Image: BREAKING: Federal government to control and oversee grocery distribution with govt / private sector partnerships: Wal-Mart, Costco, Target, Kroger, top grocery chains to be deemed “critical infrastructure” … National Guard to protect key distribution points

(Natural News) Breaking news alert – NaturalNews.com – The US federal government is in the planning stage of implementing a plan to protect and control grocery distribution across the United States via public / private partnerships with top grocery chains such as Wal-Mart, Kroger, HEB (Texas), Target, Costco, etc., high-level sources now tell Natural News. The effort is being made to ensure the smooth delivery of food supplies to the public as a coronavirus lockdown is about to commence on a regional basis, and food supplies are necessary to prevent social unrest, lawlessness and looting.

Natural News has learned details of this plan which we are told is in the final stages of being completed, with some measure of rollout to begin as early as just a few days from now in at least one region of the country. We were also told that we got the attention of the administration when I appeared on the Alex Jones Show two weeks ago and delivered predictions numbers that closely matched the classified numbers the CDC and HHS already had, none of which had been released to the public. This “caused alarm” in certain circles, we were told, because the CDC thought they had a leak to Natural News (which apparently would be the end of the world at the CDC). They later concluded that we had reached the same conclusions based on mathematical models, not any leak. I can confirm that nobody from the CDC has leaked anything to us. The reason we have arrived at the same numbers is because I can do math and as a scientist, I understand the principles of epidemiology and exponential spread. My pandemic projection spreadsheet has accurately predicted all the recent deaths with near-perfect accuracy, by the way, and I released it publicly on March 9th, revealing all the math behind the calculations.

On the good news side, we are told that Trump is working day and night to coordinate a response that keeps the American people fully supplied with food, medicine, water and security, and that this plan will be implemented with absolutely zero advanced warning to the public. We are also told that VP Mike Pence is secretly working with pharmaceutical companies to rapidly accelerate critical drug manufacturing in the United States of America, with special efforts under way to resurrect certain factories in Puerto Rico that were wiped out by the hurricane last year. The long-term plan, we are told, is to designate the pharmaceutical supplies lines as strategic infrastructure much like the strategic oil reserves, and to maintain US manufacturing of certain medications from this day forward.

The days of outsourcing everything to China, in other words, are over. Thank God globalism is finally starting to implode. Let us hope Trump uses this opportunity to promote the importance of nationalism and redundant supplies lines filled with “made in America” goods and materials.

Here are the details of the food / grocery that have been shared with us:

The scope of this plan isn’t yet clear, as at times we were told it would be “regional” but might expand from there. No specific city was mentioned, but we can imagine it will start with NYC and Seattle and follow the cities with the worst outbreaks.
The plan will NOT “nationalize” grocery chains, as the president prefers public/private partnerships that leverage the existing distribution infrastructure of the private sector, which operates more efficiently than the government. The president prefers to respect and allow the private sector to fulfill its role in society rather than try to take over those operations.
Grocery chains will be declared, via executive order, “critical infrastructure” (the wording may be slightly different, such as “essential infrastructure”) so that the executive branch of the federal government grants itself the justification to oversee food distribution and food security for the nation. This is conjecture on our part, but we believe this same executive order will also designate long-haul trucking a similar “critical infrastructure” and would likely prioritize trucking / transport operations to keep the food, fuel, medicine and other supplies flowing. Obviously, without nationwide trucking, the grocery stores run out of food in mere hours, as we are now seeing almost everywhere.
The plan will involve National Guard troops showing a presence at grocery store parking lots which will serve as distribution points. They will be given ROE (Rules of Engagement) orders to actively engage anyone who initiates violence or who attempts to steal food. There will be little or no tolerance for threats to food distribution points, grocery stores or food trucking operations.
The National Guard will be ordered to begin protecting food distribution hubs and truck routes on the highways to ensure that food trucks arrive safely at grocery stores across America. The president is reportedly about to meet with trucking union leaders and trucking organizations to finalize the structure of this plan which may include an “escort” vehicle to shadow the trucks and ensure security.
There is talk — just talk, not any decision yet — of not allowing the public to enter the grocery stores and instead setting up a “drive through” system in the parking lots, where people are allowed to purchase pre-made “grocery kits” which contain pre-selected basics such as eggs, milk, ground beef, bags of rice, etc., which are offered at a fixed price and fixed quantities, with strict limits on the allowable purchases per citizen. Presumably, there would have to be kits assembled for people who have children or infants, separate from adult kits. We are told this will not be implemented right away and is only a last-ditch measure if the spread of the virus gets far worse. However, the administration is fully aware that grocery store crowds are right now spreading the virus, especially in NYC. It also means that the government already realizes consumer choice is going to have to be strictly limited in order to achieve high-efficiency grocery distribution to the public. Kiss your gluten-free crackers goodbye if this phase of the plan goes live…
The SNAP program (food stamps) is going to be expanded under an emergency order to allow those on food assistance to increase their food stockpiles in advance of the coming lockdowns. This also means the banks that handle the SNAP transactions are about to see a huge increase in their transaction loads, which makes them prone to outages as history has shown.
Even if consumer choice is allowed to continue on grocery purchases for some time, strict limits will be placed on grocery items at the federal level. We are told the limits will apply to all the basic such as ground beef, bottled water, eggs, rice, milk, canned soups, bread, powdered milk, plus many personal hygiene and baby care items such as diapers, toilet paper, sanitizing supplies (including bleach), hand soap and even basic pharmacy items such as isopropyl alcohol and hydrogen peroxide.
TIMELINE: We are told this plan may be activated within days in certain regions (probably NYC and Seattle), but that logistics and delays could push it out to 1-2 weeks. The plan, we are told, will not affect most of Middle America where the virus is not yet reaching critical numbers. Watch this short animation to see where the hot spots are:

What this means is that many of these federal emergency efforts will be focused on the West and East Coasts. We aren’t expecting draconian lockdowns in the near future in any states other than Washington, California, New York and Virginia, with New Jersey a candidate that’s likely to follow.

That’s all we know so far.

The good news is that Trump is planning for what’s coming, and he is maintaining supply lines that are necessary to prevent mass starvation and death.

Oh, this also reminds us to tell you what Dr. Anthony Fauci said earlier today. And remember that Fauci is advising the president on everything right now. He says, “If it looks like you’re overreacting you’re probably doing the right thing.”

Yep. As reported by The Hill:

“If you just leave the virus to its own defenses it’ll go way up like we’ve seen in Italy – that’s not going to happen if we do what we’re attempting to do and are doing,” Fauci told CBS’ Margaret Brennan on “Face the Nation.”

Also worth noting: The Mayor of NYC has just announced that literally everyone in the city has likely been exposed. With everyone exposed, it’s not difficult to see that one-third of the city could become infected, and that’s millions of people.

Hence the need for the government to begin to oversee and protect food distribution centers.

And NYC Comptroller Scott Stringer just called for a total shutdown of the entire city. He’s doing that because he knows what the numbers are, and they’re already apocalyptic. The hospitals in NYC will be completely overrun in about 3-4 weeks:

If you thought the retail stores were insane yesterday and today, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

And nobody is laughing at preppers any longer…

Stay informed. Read Pandemic.news if you want to live.