Post Lockdown Shopping Habbits
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During "panic buying" people bought anything and everything in huge quantities. Personally I was rather sceptical so I didn't stock up hugely on anything. The things which were really hard to find for me was kids paracetamol, toilet paper and soap because I generally ran out of it. And some vegetarian food options were hard to find. Now everything is back at the shops and widely available. Has it changed your shopping habbits? Do you buy more than usual of some items or have you stockpiled since it all began? I probably got few extra can of beans, chopped tomatoes and some pasta more than usual. But rather than that I pretty much only buy what we need/eat in a week or so. And I definitely dont have hundreds of toilet rolls or soap in my house
We didn’t stockpile. If something of my usual item was out of stock then I was trying something new which made a pleasant change.
eyeballkerry I suppose some items like baby formula it's best to stick to one brand otherwise it can upset their tummy. And obviously some people were buying 10+ packs at once and then flogging it on Ebay for hundreds .. also for some time bread and flour were hard to find. But really unless you got huge family I dont see the need to stockpile crazy amounts of food...
BlueOrchid My daughter bakes cakes for a living so we had flour and all cooking ingredients but unfortunately she was unable to bake for others at the beginning of lock down. She probably could have sold the ingredients instead of the cakes!
eyeballkerry exactly she would of made a fortune...since everyone gone mad and started baking in lockdown. I'm sure it will pick up for her now
BlueOrchid my son was on 3 different types of formula and it never upset his stomach. If you look at the ingredients baby formula is made from the same ingredients across the brands and I was told by a dietician it didn't matter which one he got as they were all the same and if one wasn't available to buy another one. Plus in the hospital you had to use what they stocked and they used 2 brands and if one wasn't on the shelf you had to use the other one. It's fine to switch between baby formulas, as long as you aren't giving them a different one at every feed!
I food shop less often, used to do small shops a probably twice a week but now do one shop ever 1-2 weeks so more organised and less food waste as a result
Now I only shop online usually getting one delivery per week. I buy more of the everyday items, loo roll, washing powder and started stock piling tinned tomatoes plus a few jars of sauces that weren’t available at the beginning of the pandemic. I have shared with family and friends if in need.
I have shopped online, once a week, for the past two years. It makes you really think what you need and I reckon it has saved us money. We rarely pop out to the shops to pick up extra items, unless we absolutely must. I always make a list and have a rough meal plan too. I batch cook to save time and money. That's about as much stockpiling that I did during the early days of the Pandemic. I just did not understand why toilet paper was in such high demand. Bizarre!
During Lockdown, my supermarket, Ocado, failed to deliver to us twice, which was a challenge. We managed to get by with a little help from our local Cafe's suppliers. It was more expensive, but the produce was much better.
Some foods are still tricky to get, especially as I eat a lot of veggie foods. The mince was elusive for some reason. Things seem to be getting pretty much back to normal now.
Ceebers I suppose since fresh meat wasnt available everyone turned to frozen veggie meat.. I was struggling to get veggie burgers, mince anything really... but my local shops seems to be fully stocked up of it now.
I tried to go online to order and I wouldn't even be able to get to the page when the message would flash- you're in a queue 28,976.... so we did most of shop at sainsburys...which was rather costly. Usually I would shop around. I would pop to aldi etc. But during lockdown it wasnt possible to queue up for 20min or more for each shop.
BlueOrchid Yes, prices have certainly been hiked up over the last few months. There's nothing we can do though. I had a priority delivery pass, but the way I was treated was despicable. I was initially on the Government shielding list, but as I wasn't taking any treatment, at the time, the Government rode back. It made no difference to Ocado when we complained. We are still shopping with them as it is generally easy, all set up and we would not be able to start with another supermarket and get home delivery under these pandemic times that we live.
I do think things are getting back to some semblance of normality. It will be interesting to see how things go as we sashay into Autumn and flu season.
I hope that lessons have been learnt and people think twice about their own selfishness. It really did bring out the worst and the very best in peeps!
Xx
Ceebers it was infuriating when my son had a flu in March and it was impossible to get paracetamol for him...there were some ibuprofen because obviously media made it such a bubble stating that "paracetamol is better than ibuprofen for Corona symptoms"... and my son cant take ibuprofen anyway... I went to many shops and there just wasn't any..
And it was before the supermarkets clued up that some stockpilers were taking it all...
I seen a woman buying so many tubs of baby formula...and it wasnt necessarily for her baby...because as soon as the shops were sold out suddenly it was selling online for ridiculous prices...
Or I read how in Australia a man was trying to get refund for 100 packs of toilet rolls and 50 bottles of soap..the manager refused it. Because they had a limit too. And since it was limited it means he had to make so many trips by himself and left others dry...
And to see elderly walking round half empty isles all confused made me so sad...
But as you say many people came together and volunteered their time to provide food etc. So theres still hope ❤
No, I didn't stockpile. My grocery shopping habits didn't really change. I still went to my local supermarkets and other food shops, rather than order online. If one shop didn't have an item I usually found it in another. If there is a second lockdown supermarkets, etc will likely be better prepared and immediately place a quantity limit on each item.
ACR did you have to queue up? In my local shops I sometimes would have to queue up for 20min or even more... and it was impossible to order online...
BlueOrchid sometimes. Although, I'm fairly spoiled by the number of supermarkets and other food shops in my area. So if there were more than 6 people waiting outside a shop I usually walked somewhere else.
Some people were so greedy in the supermarkets. I could not believe it when we went for some basics and the shelves were stripped bare. I think the supermarkets were too slow to act with limiting items to customers. Strange times showing the true colours of so many selfish people. So sad. Xx
I think it is sensible to stock up now in anticipation of a second wave of covid. If everyone buys a little extra each time they shop retailers will be able to buy in more stock each time they order without it becoming a panic buying situation.
We didn't stockpile. We normally have a good supply for the items we need anyway so we didn't need to stock pile. We just bought the same amount of stuff we always did. We are them same now. We have shopped online for years, so that didn't change and if an item wasn't available then we got a different brand or went to the local shop for it. We didn't run out of anything and we haven't really had issues getting things, but have had to buy more expensive items to get what we need!
I'm still buying groceries online that may change when kids go back school. We need to buy 2 lots of uniform before September so need to save money so thinking carefully about buying things
I didn’t want to stockpile, but my partner went a bit crazy buying canned stuff because he saw how empty the supermarkets were and panicked.. we’re still trying to get through all the cans of soup
I used to do a monthly shop and buy fresh food once a week but I had to do shopping more frequently as I could only buy limited quantities which wouldn't last the month however I'm back to shopping monthly as it saves us money.We never stockpiled though.
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