To wish people would stop being such selfish fucking bellends.

[Soapytoad]

That’s it really. Everyone else has to KEEP going to the shops to try and find essentials because the fucking knobheads have bough and keep buying up everything.

How can you social distance when you have to constantly hop from shop to shop for basic food for your children?! I’m in the shops more now than I was before this shitshow started.

I couldn’t give a fuck if I got Covid-19, but I don’t want my kids getting it, ever. I have to leave them at home while I go out! I live rurally so no take away, no drliveroo, no community and only 2 towns 15 miles in opposite directions. Still no fucking toilet roll, still no basic veg oil, no hand sanitiser, no basic vegetables, no meat. My kids eat before I do do at least I’m losing weight now, and we have now discovered those birds eye chicken burgers approved by mumsnet. (They are amazing btw!)

Fuck off selfish people and stop putting everyone else at risk you fucking selfish, fucking boggely eyed cuntvid pisswesels.

Are shops not empty because people are being asked not to travel?
Our tiny local co-op is empty because people have stopped going to the big Tesco in the next town and it can’t cope.
Also, as it’s been said before, I’m not sure people are stockpiling but feeding my family three times a day uses up more food.

What I don't get is that (almost) everyone has loyalty cards, right? So the shops are WELL aware of who is buying what? So I fi had gone and bought 1000 loo rolls, they would know. So why aren't they doing something about it? I know that people are buying for others (I get my parents shopping as they are totally isolating and aren't setting foot out the door) but I still can get everything is one trolley. And flour!! I haven't seen bread flour for weeks! Does the whole world have a breadmaker? Oh, and anyone found throwing out food should be named, shamed then shot.

OP I understand you are pissed off. Trying to find a solution, are you sure your local shops/ farm shops are all closed? I find that incredibly hard to believe. We are similarly rural and our village butcher (usually trade only) is open and taking orders for either collection or delivery. They’ve loads in stock.

I checked for my parents yesterday who live in the next county; their village butchers shop itself is shut but they are taking orders by phone for collection outside the shop. Likewise our local baker has shut all their shops, but they are still delivering.

It might be worth doing a quick ring round before you start driving to the supermarket. Good luck.

Most panic buying was slowed or stopped by supermarkets restricting items 2-3 weeks ago at least mine did. By last week the shop.was still busy as normal but it was 'normal' shopping.
The problem is more people at home all day now. If you have 2 parents and 2 kids at home all day thats at least 20 extra meals a week maybe 10 more if kids went to breakfast clubs plus snacks. That's a lot more food in your shopping.
Supply cant keep up with demand yet it will catch up though. Dont forget people in the supply chain get ill or have to isolate too so there are possibly staffing shortages in every area.

YANBU OP!

I have spent the last 2 weeks getting increasingly furious at being told to social distance at the same time as I was trudging backwards and forwards to the shops until I finally found paracetamol (needed for an ongoing medical condition), loo roll and bread.

Yesterday, Sainsbury's (where I'd gone to buy our next loaf of bread) was still in full on nuclear apocalypse, panic buying, pushing and shoving mode with most of the shelves stripped bare. It was only as I was very hastily leaving that they started limiting the numbers coming in.

I live in a town where people are refusing to social distance and enjoying lavishly coughing over other people when they're not sweeping me off the pavement and into the roads which are still busy. I'd rather not die of Corona but equally I don't want to get mowed down by a car, thank you very much.

There are no Delivery Slots available for the next 3 weeks at Tesco (my usual home delivery shop) and none for the other shops locally according to local Facebook.

I agree with the supermarkets that if I am physically able to walk to the shops I should do so, so that the vulnerable and elderly can rightly take priority for Home Delivery. I absolutely agree that the NHS should have dedicated shopping slots too. However, is it really too much to ask that everyone should be able to shop for the essentials without their health being put at risk too?

People will be shopping more because there are no restaurants and a lot fast food places closed like McDonald's. Most people are at work in the week so now at home and kids can eat .
It wouldn't be possible for me to get enough for 2 weeks unless I rationed they food. Also the supermarkets don't have enough stock to stock up for 2 weeks . I usually do a shop every Saturday going to Lidl then Asda but as it takes so long just 1 supermarket currently and if I can't get everything i make do but then I need to go again in a few days .

Lots of the shelves are empty because of supply chain issues. Thinking it would be sorted by now is a very rose coulored view. This is a massive change in demand and priorities, and the first panic buying was about a fortnight ago. The goalposts have already moved for supermarkets once too, in the changing of delivery systems to support the vulnerable.

The shelves are empty for lots of reasons, most are perfectly valid. Getting sweary about panic buyers doesn't help. Thinking the shelves are empty because everyone is home 24/7, and goods are being delivered to the vulnerable too, will help your stress levels. Stress weakens immunity and will affect your kids. It's not helping you or anyone else.

And if you need to take the last thing from a shelf, it's no more selfish than taking the first thing or the middle thing. Meet your needs as best you can. They're no less valid than anyone else's needs. Being a martyr can be frustrating, and for you, clearly is.

I read an analysis that a supermarket had done of it's customers shopping habits over the last few weeks. It showed that very few were stockpiling (less than 3%). The shortages are caused by all customers just buying a few things extra. I haven't stockpiled, but because we knew we were going to all be at home all day every day- no school meals, no eating out, no nipping to the sandwich shop at lunchtime, etc. then I have had to buy more. I don't know anyone who has stockpiled- everyone is in the same boat.

I supposed people may be eating more at home and supply chains (say, bread normally going to sandwich shops) might not yet have been changed to divert to retail.

People need to buy more because they are all at home. DH and I normally work FT out of home. DC eat at school. We are now eating all meals at home. We are also trying to avoid having to keep going to the local convenience store too often.

I assume the just in time delivery processes most supermarkets follow were based on a big percentage of the population eating away from home during the day and now the model has suddenly changed. There are a few selfish stockpilers but I don’t think it’s as widespread as has been made out in the press. Some people are buying more things like 2 packs of bog roll instead of one because the whole family is now suddenly doing all their shitting at home.

I think the reason the shops were (still are?) so empty of food (our local Sainsbury's in Hertfordshire has been full of empty shelves for weeks), is due to the 'just in time' way that supermarkets operate. That means they don't have masses of spare stuff sitting in warehouses - they have enough to stock their shops for a week or so at a time - that way they aren't sitting on mountains of unsold food that they've had to pay for up-front. That's why we're still seeing good stocks of fresh food (which comes in daily), but poor stocks of long-life food likes tins, jars, packets, boxes and frozen food.

I think the advice to not stockpile is wildly at odds with the two pieces of advice from the government i.e. if one person in your household shows CV symptoms you must ALL isolate for 14 days; and you must shop as infrequently as possible and only pick up essentials. I've been doing that, but as a consequence we're running out food as quickly as ever - particularly with four of us at home for every meal. I'm used to shopping every 3-4 days, because that's how quickly we go through our stock of fresh food and so that is how often I need still need to shop!

I seriously have been going to all different supermarkets than you, the only things tough to get are rice, pasta (but there are prepped rice and pasta) kidney beans, baked beans, loo roll and anti bac wipes, other than that there has been plenty of everything in. Social media and media have a lot to answer for Imo for fueling the panic buying.

Oh and flour and long life milk

Yanbu i have 5 kids and im in the shops more than ever because in my local shop i can only get 1 item of each dairy, bread etc. Its a joke.
Don't want to risk big supermarkets and bringing corona back to my kids and im a single parent. I have one slot on 8th but that's it as all major supermarkets say no online shopping unless vunerable or elderly fair enough. But if i get ill theres no one to take care of my kids.

I hate going to the shop i absolutely hate it and my kids are on basics. So not only are we lockdown but treats don't last them. Pretty dire for kids who are already suffering as it is

Something needs to be done to help single mums get online shopping. The risk is too much for me to. Keep going out

BTW, not everyone can stockpile loaves of bread and just freeze everything! My freezer is quite small- I have fish fingers, some chicken, some frozen leftovers of bolognese sauce, chips, peas, sweetcorn and packet of berries and it's full. Certainly couldn't be stockpiling much in there!

And i don't drive i can't carry it from tesco

I've been stocking up from Jan for brexit, nothing major like on the telly. Just an extra tin or packet each week so I haven't been to the shops in the past 3 wks. As we're all indoors now, we're going through my reserves at an alarming rate. I will need to go to the shops next week to fill the gaps as I can't get a delivery slot.

Lots of food wholesalers and school/restaurant suppliers have switched to selling to ordinary customers. They have stock to shift that would otherwise go off as their normal customers have shut down.

See this BBC article

Myself, DPand DS are now at home every day.

DS normally ate once or twice a day at uni. DP's work supplied breakfast and and some lunches.

It means our meals at home have increased by at least a third if not more. We did not factor that in our first shop at all because I am stupid.

Two weeks ago there were only 2 bottles if gold top in the shop the rest was empty. I took one for DS to have on his cereal and left the other for someone else. I drank back coffee for the week and survived. This week there was plenty of milk.

God help the rest of my family if anyone brought all the coffee though!

I get you, OP.

I've been actively avoiding going shopping but we were about to run out of milk. Normally I will buy 5L in a weekly shop, because that's what we use. Shelves at our local shop were full of milk, as normal, so I didn't think twice about picking up 5L - but the nice lady at the tills pointed out that we were on a 2 unit limit for milk, so I put 3 back. My mistake - but now I'll have to go out again in 2-3 days, where I could have avoided going out for the week if I'd been able to get all 5.
I say again - the shelves were fully stocked with milk of all types - I wasn't stockpiling, I was buying my usual amount (of a high-end product, not basic) but now I have to increase my potential exposure.

I understand the measures but there are mixed messages - stay at home as much as possible BUT buy a weekly shop when you get there BUT you're only allowed 2 of each item AND you have to only use a basket AND only one adult in per family. These do not compute. You cannot buy a weekly shop with max 2 items of what you need and fit it all into a fucking basket!! I also can't carry a heavy basket because my hips give out.

We actually don't have all those measures YET in Australia - but our food supply hasn't been as disrupted as the toiletpaper/tissue supplies were (man, that was mental!) - and I'm hoping we don't get that far. We do have the max no. of certain items though, just not the one basket only thing. I did hear that they are starting to restrict no. of shoppers in at once, which will probably lead to only one adult per family happening soon too.

@Soapytoad

Check the Morrison’s website. They’ve launched a scheme where they will deliver a box with. £30 worth of essentials for £35 (includes the DHL deliver cost). I wish all supermarkets would launch a similar scheme. They should also have these packs set aside in store for collection by NHS etc only.

Smaller corner shop type stores seem to have more food.

Hope you get something sorted out.

If you are isolating or staying at home how do you know so much about what everyone else is buying? If you are in the supermarket buying things, why are you allowed to but no-one else is

Because it's plastered all over social media. Pictures of the queue, pictures of the shelves, ordinarily I work in a supermarket so I'm hearing from colleagues what the situation is plus my sister is having to shop for my mum and dad as well as her own family and she's telling me what it's like - having to go to five or six shops to get what they need, which isn't right at the moment plus she works full time and many people don't have cars to drive here there and everywhere so if you're older, not that mobile or relying on public transport you're a bit screwed here.

I think the advice to not stockpile is wildly at odds with the two pieces of advice from the government i.e. if one person in your household shows CV symptoms you must ALL isolate for 14 days; and you must shop as infrequently as possible and only pick up essentials

I agree with @zafferana. It’s like doublethink.

Shop less frequently and stay at home.
Shop as normal, don’t buy extra.

DH normally has lunch out 4x week, the DC between them have 6 school dinners per week. Each shop has to cover 7 days so I can leave the house less often. Obviously we will be buying more even though we are consuming the same (actually less, in practice)

I also think it’s very convenient for the government to blame food shortages of stockpilers rather than simply acknowledge that it’s a natural side effect of Stay At Home. I don’t blame them for the shortages, but I do blame them for feeding the stockpiler myth to create a neutral bogieman for us all to hate. Unfortunately, people like me who will be shopping for 2x 4-person households plus odds and ends for 2 neighbours are now going to be branded stockpilers when venturing to the supermarket.

£1.50 per person of “stockpiled” food. That’s all it amounts to.

I just can’t understand why the supermarkets main priorities aren’t click and collect and home deliveries. Who wants to be going to a supermarket now, there’s always one person who doesn’t follow the 2 metre rule. The delivery slots are weeks in advanced, it’s a nightmare as we are a large family plus I am having to do doorstep drops for my mum in her 80s.
Ps I just read on Facebook our local Chinese had people queuing for food last night, all huddled in a small place . They really don’t get it do they ?? 😞

I really thought the supply chain would have caught up by now? I realise there maybe rationing

It is completely frustrating Soapytoad. As time has gone on, I have become increasingly critical of the big supermarkets who control so much of the supply chain. It’s very easy for them to blame ‘selfish’ shoppers but what about the flaws of their ‘just in time’ stock policies? Obviously, this is exceptional but we often have problems on a smaller scale, like when we had the Beast from the East a couple of years ago.

On top of this, many supermarkets were very slow to introduce limits on what people could buy and stocks of hand gel, loo rolls and pasta went down well before lock down was introduced.

On top of this, we were all eating out more, including sandwiches etc bought at work. Now we rely on what we cook at home, there will obviously be an increase in demand.

I have seen photos of beautifully stocked supermarkets in Italy and Spain. By contrast, there was the video of the people in Australia fighting over loo roll. So now I am not just blaming the selfish people who buy ridiculous amounts of stuff for their freezers and cupboards or who barge into the NHS worker/vulnerable people shopping slots but also the supermarkets who should plan to sell their stock more fairly.