To wonder why are the supermarkets empty?

[TheColourofspring]

I live in a big city on the south coast. In the last few days, I have been to Asda, coop and sainsburys- mainly because all 3 had big gaps on the shelves & I couldn’t get what I needed. Asda was the worst by far- hardly any basics in stock- empty gaps on the shelves- barely any veggie stuff. Etc. Not much bread - it was really weird. The other 2 supermarkets also had gaps. Also big reductions on choice- definitely the worst I have seen.

Is it summer? Back to school madness? The dreaded B word?

It will be a combination of things, end of the month payday, children back at school next week so people buying stuff for packed lunches and cost of living, so items that are on special offer or cheaper brands will sell out quicker.

I haven't noticed any problems in Herts recently. There have been times in the past three years when there have been products unavailable for weeks or even months and rolling gaps on shelves, but recently that seems to have improved a lot. It's just the prices, which are ridiculous! Even Asda is expensive these days.

South from over a year have some problems, not sure why.

Here in the East Midlands we seem to live a charmed life - no shortages of eggs tomatoes salad etc even during the times when the media was saying shops were empty.
Everything seems fine but maybe we just eat boring stuff.
Come to think of it the Organic Farm shop was out of eggs yesterday, but co-op had loads.

Probably short staffed so no one to fill the shelves. I work at morrisons and we are due a pay rise next month. They pay for that by cutting staff hours and not replacing people who leave. It's shit.

Could it be that one supermarket has supply problems in your area and this has lead their usual customers to go elsewhere and created a knock on effect with the other shops in the area suddenly having increased demand. There are no problems in my area accept when Tesco's fridges breakdown and they have to empty them, which they have a few times recently, almost immediately all the other local supermarkets start to suffer chilled food shortages.

Lots of empty shelves at the Asda near me. The regular staff there tell me that there’s plenty of stock “ in the back “ but staff numbers have been cut so much that they are short of people to fill the shelves.

It reminded me a bit today of going to New Zealand about 15 years ago- there was a real lack of choice - it was the same today. Much less veggie stuff, hard to get things like lentils & beans too. Sainsburys definitely better for choice but expensive!

Near me. They all seem to be business as possible

Asda’s always looked like an Eastern bloc country round me.

Another cost cutter at the Asda near me is they’re turning down the lighting ( not just during the Sunday browsing time). Difficult for people with poor vision to negotiate what’s on the shelves.

You should try working in there when the shop is shut. End up with a rotten headache trying to see where stuff is 😭😭

heatherMoores I get you. But packed shelves and good quality are hard to resist. Working out value for money ain't easy

Extreme weather in Spain etc. Catastrophic floods in India has affected rice exports. It's going to be expensive this winter re wheat.

Where I am is the same, for us it's the student population starting to come back. It almost doubles our towns population when they're here and most shops fail to consider this until it's too late and there's no milk, bread, eggs but it soon sorts itself out.

All the supermarkets are fine in East Midlands. Maybe less variety but do we really need 7 different tomatoes and 6 different toilet rolls...there's still plenty for everyone. The only thing we can't get is a turkey roast but assume that's due to avian flu.

That’s a great way of putting it. I’ve been to New Zealand a few times and you’re correct. It was like shopping here at home for me. In fact I’d say where I live is now better than where I stay in the UK when back.

My eldest works for ASDA when home from Uni.

I asked him why the shelves were empty and he was saying it's down to the delay of getting the goods onto the shelves. He works out the back and when he first went in, the stocking on the shelves was a week behind and they aren't catching up.

He was also saying the ordering of stock has been really bad in the store.

Mix in with that they are rearranging where things go, it's a right mess.

The bare shelves are due to brexit.
They are in the areas with the most remainers. It’s a punishment for their views.

Well that's not the case here. Vast majority voted leave and the shelves are pretty empty.

I found it hard to find many things even five years ago in the UK. Can't get a decent size bag of brown rice (all 1kg bags), only just found Lebanese bread in one supermarket, tabbouleh, a decent choice of beef sausages.

South Wales here and all stocked as normal, lots of choice.
Lots of veggies and bread too, though you may face empty boxes for some products if you shop late in the evening.
It must have something to do with the distribution chain or lack of staff in your area.
There has been a few posts like this in the last months.

I live in the South East too- and there are a lot of gaps in our supermarkets.

The only issue I've noticed is that eggs are still limited. You can usually find them but are limited to 2 or 3 packs and at the end of a day they've normally run out.

I chatted to an ASDA manager a while back who said that deliveries had gone from weekly to twice weekly due to C-O-L and people ordering more things online. It seemed well enough stocked to me but I couldn't do my usual and get everything in one place (groceries, school clothes and shoes and a couple of birthday presents) because ranges were very limited.

Is anyone else suffering from what appears to be the orange juice shortage? I like a glass of it with breakfast and there hasn't been any in our local Lidl for weeks!