I stopped by a Price Chopper on the way home today. It was an incredible sight - toilet paper and cleaner/sanitizer shelves stripped bare; most other shelves down to under 50% of stock; lines at all registers at 6PM. If it was TX I would have slung an AR over my shoulder - not out of fear of anything happening, but the atmosphere of the place just seemed to call for it
. And to think my wife, mother and brother thought I was crazy when I bought two 20 rolls packs of toilet paper earlier this week. As I told my wife "You may not appreciate it yet, but you will when we dip into my reserve and you don't have to use both sides of each sheet as we run low".
A friend emailed me a photo of WalMart where he scored the very last case on the shelf, thanking me for sharing my paranoia with him before it was too late.
I wonder if people who are working from home will start going into the office to do their #2s when their stash runs out.
The difference with the sanitizer/cleaner shortage and the TP shortage is that the use rate of TP is not increasing; people are just laying in stockpiles. Once the supply lines fill it should be back to normal - not so for sanitizer where the supply line has to increase the flow and not just fill a one time gap.
I remember the first great primer shortage - people were talking about it on NES before it hit our area. Those who heeded the warning did fine; those who waited were beating the bushes trying to score some. The TP scenario was identical - talk of shortage down under before it hit here.