It's easy to panic buy...........

An old school friend who now lives in Australia has just sent me this.

Went to the supermarket this morning and the only thing I couldn't get were bananas!

OK there was no hand wash, but there was soap. Loo roll shelves were not completely empty. As I live in a rural area, I do have a well stocked freezer of homemade meals, but that is normal for me. Like others I am puzzled at the panic buying of toilet rolls!

I have just got back from my weekly shop in Sainsbury, I have never seen so little stock on shelves. This is getting stupid and the companies are making mega bucks. Every year we put up with the flu and no body panic buys for that and yes it kills many many people. Wash your hands and be sensible.

I bought a 12 pack of toilet rolls last week, normal for me as they are cheaper than buying 4 rolls every time. No panic buying just my normal shop. Plenty of fresh veg delivered as normal. I only have a small freezer but it has chicken & home cooked meals in there.

I was in ALDI on Wednesday & shelves were well stocked, my local Co-op has mostly well stocked shelves although I did notice toilet roll stocks were somewhat depleted.

I have my milk delivered from a local farm & we have a good bakers, greengrocers & butcher in Town plus a Deli so I doubt I will stave, I have enough to survive if necessary.

Why are people buying soap in such huge quantities? didn't they wash their hands? I always have a reasonable stock of soap. Hand sanitiser I use when I'm out as I have sensitive skin & find some soaps in public toilets bring me out in an itchy rash.

There will always be panic buying of one commodity or another whenever there is a situation like the Coronavirus! But NOT for me! Why on earth people think food is going to be in short supply beggars belief, for goodness sake, GET A GRIP!
Someone mentioned a symptom of Coronavirus is diarrhoea so people then think "ooh! Best stock up on loo roll" !
It's panic buying that leads to shortages and empty shelves not national emergency.
Do a normal shop for goodness sake!

Merlotgran ?? ? some people are so clever at these things.

No I am not panic buying but I do think the shops have got to limit people over buying.

We live 20 minutes from the nearest shop and there is no internet shopping in rural France. We always keep a good stock of food and and have bought a bit extra as we would presumably not be able to go shopping if we get it. Our village is very co-operative and someone would doubtless collect prescriptions. The Mairie and the local council will make sure everyone is ok. There would be no shortage of milk, cider and calvados as that is all around us.
I don't think there are any rules here; you have to do what is sensible given your circumstances.

The medicine shelves in Morrisons were empty. No ibuprofen or paracetamol except a few packets of expensive brands. I bought one of those because I need to have ibuprofen at home but it will go as soon as they refill. It seems to be the same everywhere.
I have never seen it so busy but apparently it was partly because their bank card machines went down for a while.
It is easy to catch the 'buy it when you see it bug'.

merlotgran is that toilet paper those people are wrapped in? How dare they - don't they know there's a shortage in some panicky parts of the UK?

I'm sure they will use the toilet paper after taking the photo. It should be folded nicely and placed ready for use ?

It can then be sold as recycled toilet roll.

We started buying ahead a year or so ago, mainly on BOGOFFs and other offers, when the talk was all about shortages following crashing out of Europe. We never thought there would be a problem - we just didn't want to have to go to the shops if the tabloids declared a shortage! We've sort of carried on, half heartedly as we have the space. We also started getting our loo paper delivered in bulk from a wonderful company called Who Gives a Crap - who don't use plastic wrapping and put a proportion of their profits into building loos in parts of the world that dont have them. Because I miscalculated we now have enough to last until the summer!! Why are people buying loo paper? Its surely because the advice is to cough/sneeze into a tissue and throw it away - loo paper is cheaper per square than a tissue!

I just dont get it, on the off chance that you have to stay in for 2 weeks why does that mean you will need dozens of toilet rolls and bottled water.

I can't believe this panic buying, having been to Sainsburys this morning and seen that they have absolutely no toilet paper.
I'm going away soon for a couple of days and have been trying without success to buy some antibacterial hand gel or wipes.

I have a friend who is a clean freak and I had to laugh when she said she'd been out and bought a year's supply of cleaning products and bleach because of the threat of shortages! I have to admit that cleaning products would never appear on my panic list if I had one!

My son went to Waitrose.
There were no Paracetamol tablets left but had there been the price had been put up to 70p per packet.
Disgraceful.

This is ridiculous.
This morning my husband needed to go to Boots and there was a young woman trying to buy TEN bottles of hand sanitiser. They wouldn’t let her, so she made a huge fuss and started to cry!
We always have a reasonable amount of stuff in the house, tins of salmon, rice , etc, and have not bought anything extra to what we normally buy.

I think that the buying is because people are becoming aware of the implications of a prolonged epidemic. 20 percent of the workforce off sick could result in staff shortages so problems with deliveries and the supply chain. Plus people will not wish to mix with others as numbers multiply. Interesting, despite all the reassurance yesterday it seems that the government are talking to suppliers/supermarkets this afternoon. Looking like they may not have put a lot of thought into this aspect of the current situation.

There seem to be 2 threads on panic buying at the minute.
I just got a small Sainsbury delivery. The driver said he has 16 crates for one customer. Another customer, a doctor interestingly (not sure he should have told me but no name) bought 30 packets of weetabix. I am now a bit worried about shops running out of stuff.

I just cannot understand how stupid and selfish people can be. There are sixty million people in the U.K. and the proportion of cases and death is extremely low. Those people who are stockpiling are very selfish. There are millions in this world so much worse off.
Many years ago there was a shortage of
paper and some wit said “use both sides”!
What is wrong with washing your rear end.
I lived through the war so know what shortages were like.
we made do and survived. If we weren’t bombed !

Only went to Morrisons for a few items and it was manic. Cars all over the place, check out queues very long. Very little soap, no hand wash, few loo rolls! Crazy behaviour so I stocked up on wine!!
People need to be sensible and think of those who cannot carry much. We are behaving like idiots!!

I’ve just come back from my local Waitrose and there isn’t a toilet roll, packet of pain killers, or wipes on the sleeves there. I didn’t check out the non perishable food items..... it’s crazy.

I would never ‘stock up’ , just because I am lucky enough to afford to do it. What about people who live week to week , and haven’t got spare cash to over buy. Have we not learnt any humility ....surely if it comes to it, rationing of essentials ( as in the war) is the right way to go.... not richer people sweeping all before them, and bugger the rest! As for overbuying on the premise that we may have to self-isolate..... rubbish. All of us , on here, are obviously computer literate...set up a Tesco...Sainsbury’s .... or whatever your supermarket preference is .... account and shop til you drop on-line. That overbuying bird don’t fly!!

Could not believe today, Asda completely cleared of all dried pasta. Went to Aldi and found some