I just think toilet paper is something that doesn't have seasonal spikes. Maybe in Jackson Hole NO PUN INTENDED where the resident population quintuples in summer but even then, a couple of years of data should tell them enough to predict very precisely how much to have on the next truck. It's probably one of the most consistent retail products in all the land, AND it's bulky, so it's expensive to warehouse more than necessary in the retail store. Costco gets trucks several times a week, so they can resupply quickly. 1000 Costcos all doing an unscheduled early restock will be hard to deal with, but somewhere in KirklandLand there's got to be a small forest worth of paper products waiting to be transferred to the distribution center. They would do that on a set schedule too, normally. So if someone thinks "I might not be able to leave the house for a month, what should I buy?" everyone will toss an extra package of TP on the cart. Exactly one day of that and Costco will be calling Kirkland for a resupply.
Costco is only one player in the retail game and they are far more centralized than is typical. Other big box stores are similar but most grocers aren't.
Distribution is far more geographically dispersed than you might imagine, even for companies like Amazon. Seriously.
Most grocers get one truck a week (plus independent shipments from dairies, bakeries, etc.) so a sudden unpredicted run on TP won't be resolved until that truck comes. But those regional distribution centers also stock a precise amount of TP (I'm guessing) because by its nature, its sell-thru rate is normally going to be extremely predictable. It will look silly in hindsight, but if every store and distribution point carries 10% more TP than they *know* they'll need, well warehouse space is cheap but not free, so they're going to look at that 10% and think it's worth the small risk of running out because they're going to be pretty confident in their numbers and know they won't run out.
Billings Costco announced yesterday that they got 50 pallets of TP in. It'll probably be gone by now, but I'm guessing the blip in their supply will level out soon. Unless people hoard even more now.
Things you don't want to run out of. Food, yes. But paper products too. If someone in your house is ill, you don't want to use the ol' terrycloth hand towel for a week. Use paper and throw it out. If you've never really counted how much of those things you use, your guess might be wildly off. But the stuff doesn't go bad, so might as well get 50% more than your worst case scenario, right? So anyway it isn't that you're worried about not being able to find any, later (Costco is working overtime to refill from their distribution points so I think this will run its course sooner than the virus), they're just worried about having enough on hand in case they self-quarantine for a month.
I don't get the bottled water thing either.
Yes, paper towels are critical, actually. They are the most sanitary way to dry your hands, and to clean up messes and spills. Single use, dispose. No way to hold any germs to pass on to the next user. Also used in Microwave cooking.
We use distilled water and buy it in cases of 6 gallon bottles each, 6 cases at a pop. Each case weighs 55 lbs and they are getting to be a bitch to move around. Makes delicious coffee and the maker never needs descaling. It's only about 70¢ when we buy it by the gallon at one particular place we go to. Critical in the previous place we lived that had nasty well water. Now I prefer the taste.
This conversation reminds me a bit of all the Y2K stuff.
I just think toilet paper is something that doesn't have seasonal spikes. Maybe in Jackson Hole NO PUN INTENDED where the resident population quintuples in summer but even then, a couple of years of data should tell them enough to predict very precisely how much to have on the next truck. It's probably one of the most consistent retail products in all the land, AND it's bulky, so it's expensive to warehouse more than necessary in the retail store. Costco gets trucks several times a week, so they can resupply quickly. 1000 Costcos all doing an unscheduled early restock will be hard to deal with, but somewhere in KirklandLand there's got to be a small forest worth of paper products waiting to be transferred to the distribution center. They would do that on a set schedule too, normally. So if someone thinks "I might not be able to leave the house for a month, what should I buy?" everyone will toss an extra package of TP on the cart. Exactly one day of that and Costco will be calling Kirkland for a resupply.
Costco is only one player in the retail game and they are far more centralized than is typical. Other big box stores are similar but most grocers aren't.
We live in a just-in-time world. Most grocers have about 3-days worth of inventory...if there was a 'crisis'towns and cities would run out of food pretty quick. One of the problems of living in an 'efficient' society.
Kinda. Grocery stores also have warehouses and wholesalers. If absolutely nothing is moving (even across town) then yeah, the shelves could be bare in a couple of days, but that's a pretty extreme situation.
I just think toilet paper is something that doesn't have seasonal spikes. Maybe in Jackson Hole NO PUN INTENDED where the resident population quintuples in summer but even then, a couple of years of data should tell them enough to predict very precisely how much to have on the next truck. It's probably one of the most consistent retail products in all the land, AND it's bulky, so it's expensive to warehouse more than necessary in the retail store. Costco gets trucks several times a week, so they can resupply quickly. 1000 Costcos all doing an unscheduled early restock will be hard to deal with, but somewhere in KirklandLand there's got to be a small forest worth of paper products waiting to be transferred to the distribution center. They would do that on a set schedule too, normally. So if someone thinks "I might not be able to leave the house for a month, what should I buy?" everyone will toss an extra package of TP on the cart. Exactly one day of that and Costco will be calling Kirkland for a resupply.
We live in a just-in-time world. Most grocers have about 3-days worth of inventory...if there was a 'crisis'towns and cities would run out of food pretty quick. One of the problems of living in an 'efficient' society.
Kinda. Grocery stores also have warehouses and wholesalers. If absolutely nothing is moving (even across town) then yeah, the shelves could be bare in a couple of days, but that's a pretty extreme situation.
Location: Really deep in the heart of South California Gender:
Posted:
Mar 10, 2020 - 10:04pm
ScottFromWyoming wrote:
KurtfromLaQuinta wrote:
I don't get the bottled water thing either.
It's the new drug. Not to mention all that plastic.
Scott... I think I could live without paper towels for awhile too. Inconvenient again. I have enough terry cloth towels to cycle through very easily for quite a while. Even if I have to beat them on a rock with soapy water to get them clean. Just think how much I'll save the Earth on that deal.
Location: Really deep in the heart of South California Gender:
Posted:
Mar 10, 2020 - 10:00pm
black321 wrote:
KurtfromLaQuinta wrote:
black321 wrote:
We live in a just-in-time world. Most grocers have about 3-days worth of inventory...if there was a 'crisis'towns and cities would run out of food pretty quick. One of the problems of living in an 'efficient' society.
You'd think food would be more important in a crisis situation. I think I'm smart enough to figure out how to survive easily on my own for quite awhile. I'm sure they're people here that are smarter than me. Yes? Toilet paper... really? For cryin' out loud... there's lots of ways to deal with that simple problem. Inconvenient? Sure. Life or death? Really? We're always concerned about earthquakes around these parts. Water can be an issue. Maybe. We have over 50 swimming pools in my neighborhood. I have buckets. I have pots and pans. I have a nice barbecue with lots of firewood. I can boil water all day long if I needed it. And that would be a severe problem. When something bad happens, utilities are fixed within a few days of a disaster. Am I concerned about this virus? Yes. Just as much as I am about getting the flu. And I haven't had that in years. Now where is that wood? Knock. Knock.
Things you don't want to run out of. Food, yes. But paper products too. If someone in your house is ill, you don't want to use the ol' terrycloth hand towel for a week. Use paper and throw it out. If you've never really counted how much of those things you use, your guess might be wildly off. But the stuff doesn't go bad, so might as well get 50% more than your worst case scenario, right? So anyway it isn't that you're worried about not being able to find any, later (Costco is working overtime to refill from their distribution points so I think this will run its course sooner than the virus), they're just worried about having enough on hand in case they self-quarantine for a month.
So hard to get our heads around closing schools. Matter of pride etc. I don't interact with the public much or often, but I'm wondering how to decide when to pull my kids. We're out in the hinterlands, but that actually means a lot of us travel in confined metal tubes quite often...
I'm in O'Hare changing planes. Nobody is traveling...the place is eerily quiet. No need to stand in any lines.
Big, big difference over my O'Hare transit in Feb.
The wife flies home Thurs night on the red eye changing planes at SFO. Then going to do a turn around and leave to return to SoCal next Thursday. Going to start looking for a one way ticket shortly and try to take a different route, hopefully through Vegas. They tend to keep McCarran pretty tidy.
It's pure cotton and gets carried in pants. Not washing your hands after handling bills is roughly equivalent to fondling raspy's undershorts then going for a sandwich.
Okay, not the image I wanted in my head this morning.
But yeah, didn't some lab swab a bunch of bills from circulation, and found all manner of bad stuff on them? I'm pretty sure hand-washing after handling money is already a required food-safety procedure (in the US anyway). c.
Yeah right. The number of times I've been in a takeout place here or the US where the person assembling your food, wearing plastic gloves, pauses to take your money without taking their gloves off...
It's like the admonition to not touch your face... only causes people to touch their face more often.
Supermarkets are now rationing many staples, and looking for new ways to service the demands of self-isolating consumers. Delivery sales, which were only about 4% of sales, are rising. There's going to be pain for a lot of borderline retailers, smaller regional chains...
I went to Costco yesterday to get some paper towels. Mind you... this was just getting some because we were running out. I was shocked, SHOCKED at the paranoid people buying toilet paper, paper towels and bottled water by carts (plural) full! They ran out of bottled water in the 5 minutes I was there... right after they opened! So explain to me: does corona virus cause massive amounts of diarrhea where you need to hoard toilet paper? Why the paper towel hoarding? And don't get me started on the bottled water. What would happen if there was truly a crises here? Really?
To put the best light on it, people don't tend to keep a prudent amount of supplies on hand until they are confronted with a crisis then try to fix it and often over-react. Also, people need to feel like they are doing something about a problem so they don't feel helpless. That's not entirely a bad thing until they go overboard or start fighting over TP.
Yeah, I made sure I had a modest stash of things in case I get stuck inside for a couple of weeks. Had a friend stuck in self-quarantine after returning from Italy. Luckily he made the trip without his partner so she moved out and was able to pitch supplies over the fence to him (ok, actually she left them at the door).
It's pure cotton and gets carried in pants. Not washing your hands after handling bills is roughly equivalent to fondling raspy's undershorts then going for a sandwich.
Okay, not the image I wanted in my head this morning.
But yeah, didn't some lab swab a bunch of bills from circulation, and found all manner of bad stuff on them? I'm pretty sure hand-washing after handling money is already a required food-safety procedure (in the US anyway). c.
Yeah right. The number of times I've been in a takeout place here or the US where the person assembling your food, wearing plastic gloves, pauses to take your money without taking their gloves off...
It's pure cotton and gets carried in pants. Not washing your hands after handling bills is roughly equivalent to fondling raspy's undershorts then going for a sandwich.
Money? You mean that stuff you see people carry in old movies? I'm liking my fitbit pay.
Supermarkets are now rationing many staples, and looking for new ways to service the demands of self-isolating consumers. Delivery sales, which were only about 4% of sales, are rising. There's going to be pain for a lot of borderline retailers, smaller regional chains...
I went to Costco yesterday to get some paper towels. Mind you... this was just getting some because we were running out. I was shocked, SHOCKED at the paranoid people buying toilet paper, paper towels and bottled water by carts (plural) full! They ran out of bottled water in the 5 minutes I was there... right after they opened! So explain to me: does corona virus cause massive amounts of diarrhea where you need to hoard toilet paper? Why the paper towel hoarding? And don't get me started on the bottled water. What would happen if there was truly a crises here? Really?
Bottled water...don't get it. Paper towels? No idea.
Toilet paper...Not something I want to do without.
Logic tells you not to worry....they'll be plenty...but logic isn't always a self-serving way to make decisions. If every idiot in your town thinks they need 6 months of toilet paper instead of the 6 weeks they normally have on hand when buying at Costco, then Costco will sell 4X the normal amount of TP. If you run leaner...2 weeks of inventory, then you start wondering if you have to join the panic. Add in the fact that the entire country is at risk (unlike a natural disaster or storm), and the mind wanders into all types of crazy scenarios.
I'm not a gun person, but having seen how people reacted during superstorm Sandy, civilization is always about 3 days away from chaos. I ended up driving 5-gallon gas cans to friends and co-workers in the worst-hit areas, and I could have sold them for $50 or $100 each. In the time it took to transfer 10 cans to a friend, I had 4 people stop and ask if I was selling it. I filled them up 20 miles away without waiting...my area wasn't impacted. That week around here...people were running for empty gas cans the moment Home Depot opened at 6am.
Scenarios like these require intelligent, trustworthy leadership. Electing a President shouldn't be only about abortion and the second amendment, it needs to include some trust in times of great distress and chaos, and prioritization of having teams in place to address the issues immediately when needed. Political "yes men" without the experience and skills needed to solve complex problems are going to get a lot of people killed someday...
Supermarkets are now rationing many staples, and looking for new ways to service the demands of self-isolating consumers. Delivery sales, which were only about 4% of sales, are rising. There's going to be pain for a lot of borderline retailers, smaller regional chains...
I went to Costco yesterday to get some paper towels. Mind you... this was just getting some because we were running out. I was shocked, SHOCKED at the paranoid people buying toilet paper, paper towels and bottled water by carts (plural) full! They ran out of bottled water in the 5 minutes I was there... right after they opened! So explain to me: does corona virus cause massive amounts of diarrhea where you need to hoard toilet paper? Why the paper towel hoarding? And don't get me started on the bottled water. What would happen if there was truly a crises here? Really?
We live in a just-in-time world. Most grocers have about 3-days worth of inventory...if there was a 'crisis'towns and cities would run out of food pretty quick. One of the problems of living in an 'efficient' society.
