We are back to grocery stores being out of EVERYTHING

Not at my market (Publix). They've finally started getting things I haven't been able to find for months back on the shelves.

Plus, we are back to nobody working. Just so strange…

No idea if that's true here in town or not, we're on winter break and the stores don't stock as much when college students aren't in town. But I was just able to get a bunch of crazy stuff like mashed cauliflower and Life Cuisine dinners so it can't be that bad.

Where is you, gurl?

Is there a Philadelphia Cream Cheese shortage? Hasn't been in stock for weeks.

Last week the local Kroger was out of lactose free milk when I went there, except they had some with an expiration date of Dec. 18 (this was on January 2). I made a delivery order with them on Wednesday and the shopper said they still only had the old milk out, and sent me a picture of the otherwise empty case. The expiry date on that milk is usually a month or even two months out, so that stuff was OLD.

looking good here

All's well here. We went to pick up some things before the snowstorm a few days ago. Where do you live, OP?

r5, that cream cheese shortage of a couple weeks ago never materialized here (Westchester Co, NY). Not only was there plenty of it, but it was on sale 2/$5 right before Christmas.

Weird. No frozen vegetables, but fresh were fine, even on sale.

Hams were abundant and on sale

It's fine here in the Midwest, OP. Not sure where you are getting your information from.

I found toilet paper, but no sanitary napkins

Well, pack that cunt well, cunt.

The snowstorm that blocked I-95 has screwed deliveries according to the butcher at my supermarket.

Well, I'm in CA and the Omicron surge has hit here hard.

For all of you that prissed, "Well, we have everything in the store!" wait a week or so until the Omicron variant mows down 2/3rds of the staff, and then you'll experience it.

In area around Philly it’s worse that I’ve ever seen it. Not sure if it’s Covid hitting employees or producers or supply chain issues. But it’s much, much worse than anytime in past 2 years.

Blame the Biden administration for not opening up more ports.

Just outside Chicago, haven't been able to find saltines for weeks.

Harris Teeter is closing early again

Trader Joe stores in LA seems to be weathering the shortages pretty well.

Oh I so miss Harris Teeter. Fucking Kroger & Publix ran them out of my city. Pissed me off no end!

my bank closed all branches henceforth - all branches are so short staffed that only appointments can be made now

NE Ohio here, no issues at our grocery stores. Last time I had a hard time finding anything it was around Thanksgiving and Christmas - jarred chicken gravy was pretty much sold out, all they had was turkey gravy. However, that's to be expected around the holidays.

Jarred chicken gravy! Blech, no wonder things don’t run out there

No frozen veggies in local CT grocery and some grocery stores are abbreviating their hours because of staff shortages

They're out of Fleet Enemas again, I had to go to 6 different stores to get a decent stockpile.

Online pet food store is running out.

Use a covid test instead

Sorry I meant to say online pet food store Chewy…

[quote]Is there a Philadelphia Cream Cheese shortage? Hasn't been in stock for weeks.

There is one plant in Wisconsin that produces the bulk of the US's cream cheese (under a number of brands). That plant, like most nowadays, has a lot of automated machinery. And several weeks ago their computer network got hacked. Result: the plant was put out of operation until they could get their network secured and the malware removed.

Anyhow, that led to a short-term shortage of cream cheese, varying by location and by brand, but the plant is back in production so supplies are on their way back to normal.

But it was bad enough that Kraft, owners of the Philadelphia Cream Cheese brand, had a one-day online promotion for people who couldn't find cream cheese to make their holiday desserts. They had a website where you could register to receive $20 check from Kraft to help cover the cost of having to buy a dessert, or to buy the supplies to make a non-cheesecake dessert. Limited to the first 18,000 registrants, but still - pretty generous deal.

I got the last gallon of skim milk and organic yogurt and the bread aisle looked like Soviet Russia.

Also, I had a craving for a comfort food that my mom let me have occasionally and they were out: no Spaghetti O’s with franks!

Dog food is the hardest thing to get as is Kashi whole grain waffles.

[quote]Blame the Biden administration for not opening up more ports.

You think a port could be created and opened just anywhere and out of thin air? Are you really that dumb?

The entire WORLD is experiencing a supply chain crisis. There are a number of factors that are causing it, and that are also making it harder to get back to normal.

1. A huge boom in sales. People staying home during the pandemic ended up doing a lot more shopping. That meant considerably more good being ordered by retailers from their overseas suppliers. That has led to two problems, the first being a lopsided supply crisis with shipping containers - in short, the US and Europe are overflowing with containers they've run out of room to store, while China (the world's primary supplier of manufactured goods) has a shortage. Result: good are sitting in the warehouses and ports in China, waiting for shipping containers, and ships to take them overseas.

2. The huge spike in orders for consumer goods has led to supply and shipping shortages of non-consumer goods and materials that are critically needed in key sectors such as manufacturing and health care. If your car or household appliance needs repair, cross your fingers, because replacement parts are getting harder and harder to locate. Health care providers are once again experiencing shortages of personal protective gear, not to mention a number of prescription drugs and assorted necessary medical supplies. This is the worst time in your lifetime to need medical care, since not only is there a staff shortage, there's a shortage of drugs and equipment also needed for your care. In some cases, that means you go without or they are forced to improvise (yikes).

As for US ports, due to the "no new taxes" party, since the 1980s our ports have been consistently shorted sufficient federal funding to enable them to just keep up with the increasing traffic over the years. They have been almost completely unable to update their facilities to permit them to load and unload with more efficiency and speed and fewer people involved. For example, ports in Europe, using modern automation, can unload ships 4-6 times faster than US ports. In Europe, they invest tax money into their ports. In the US, spending on infrastructure has been consistently shorted and blocked by the Party of No for decades.

Biden did arrange with the longshore unions and the ports to extend the ports' hours of operations, but at this point that is pretty much a meaningless gesture, because our ports are overflowing with unloaded shipping containers waiting for pickup by truckers to be taken out of the port. In fact, they're stacking additional shipping containers on side streets, since the ports are overflowing. But thanks to the deregulation of the trucking industry back in the Reagan era, wages and working conditions for truckers are so terrible, the industry has been hemorrhaging drivers for years. That's been a supply line issue for years; the current international supply line crisis has finally pushed it beyond the breaking point. Of course, the trucking industry's "solution" isn't to raise pay and improve working conditions, no. Instead they're pushing for a federal law permitting teenagers to be licensed to drive semis cross-country. Teenagers. You know, those kids the auto insurance companies don't want to touch because of their horrific driving records? Yeah. Now just imagine the next time you're stopped at a light and the teenager driving the semi behind is busy texting on his phone and doesn't hit the brakes in time. You'll end up road pizza.

This is what happens when capitalism takes "efficiency" and cost-cutting too far. Put all your manufacturing eggs in China's basket, and eventually you won't be able to get your goods out of China fast enough. Create double-digit turnover in the trucking business, and you won't be able to get enough trucks in and out of the ports to get goods out and empty containers back in to be sent back to China.

It'll be 1-2 more years of this, per the experts.

[quote] Just outside Chicago, haven't been able to find saltines for weeks.

There has been a saltine shortage in LA for months. We just started getting them back. I love them with peanut butter and nobody believed me that there was the great saltine shortage of LA. I took a photo of the huge hole where they used to be (I'm sure DL can relate). The stated coming back but are more expensive.

Everything is much more expensive recently, btw. I always buy the same stuff and noticed a huge price difference over the past few weeks.

I suspect you're right