Global Supply Chain Crisis 2021: Megathread - A cozy thread for watching the supply chain fall apart just in time for the holidays

[George Lucas]

They could just do what the Scots do.

Spoiler: Clarification

Scotsmen don’t wear underwear.

 

[DejaThoris]

They could just do what the Scots do.

Heroin?

 

[spinal gas chamber]

They could just do what the Scots do.

Sheep?

 

[Corette]

Sheep?

That's Welsh.

 

[Zbk3VmLfujjzjxBd43tL]

If it takes you thirty minutes to turn ten cents into two dollars, you just made $3.80 an hour.

What do you mean I gotta do it in like 3 minutes to make my living wage of $21/hour?

I want to ask what kind of person actually wears the shit they get from the army, but it's a european country so it's probably frilly panties.

I've got surplus exercise shirts from the Army, very comfortable to wear exercising, to bed, or to work outside in and still wearable after 8 years.

 

[Larry David's Opera Cape]

I regularly stop by a drive thru Starbucks while doing errands. It is usually very busy, rarely slow, so, doing good business.

They reduced the hours substantially just after Christmas. Now yesterday and today they were closed, with a note on the door. The note today had changed from yesterday's and said they will be closed tomorrow as well, then open very limited hours on Thursday.

There were a couple young women present when I drove by, hauling trash out of the building and looking very tired and harried. I had never seen them before so I presume they had come from another location to help out. The store was closed at 1 pm but it looked like they were cleaning up a mess left by a crew that had left abruptly the last time it was open.

Very odd and kind of eerie. I know, I know, it's just a coffee shop. But I have seen a lot of weird things happen over the years, the aftermath of 9/11, the 2008 crash, so on and so forth. I even remember how my parents dealt with that big recession in the early 90s. And this is bizarre. Are the staff quitting? Are they all down with coof, or booster side effects? Did they walk out en masse and leave a mess? Or have medical emergencies?

I've been watching everything very carefully over the last 2 years and just have a bad, bad feeling.

 

[Tanner Glass]

Very odd and kind of eerie. I know, I know, it's just a coffee shop. But I have seen a lot of weird things happen over the years, the aftermath of 9/11, the 2008 crash, so on and so forth. I even remember how my parents dealt with that big recession in the early 90s. And this is bizarre. Are the staff quitting? Are they all down with coof, or booster side effects? Did they walk out en masse and leave a mess? Or have medical emergencies?

I've been watching everything very carefully over the last 2 years and just have a bad, bad feeling.

Most of what you outlined.

Most Starbucks (and most retail) are staffed by young kids.
- Staff are quitting, with "work from home" being much larger - younger kids have much more better opportunities than before.
- Most retail stores have some level of friendship/camaraderie between staff. If someone finds a better job that has room for more - people on that staff are going to get poached.
- Retail Managers have been getting fucked extremely hard and are the most likely to jump ship to a better opportunity. A store losing a manager and not being able to replace him is devastating.
- Because of the decreased work force, you've got more "bad promotions" - Managers, Assistant Managers, Team Leads, Shift Supervisors, etc - that are extremely out of their depth but someone has to do that job.
- Retail is a great way to catch COVID - as you're dealing with a huge amount of people and transactions constantly. For Starbucks specifically, it's not uncommon to hit 160 customers in an hour. Obviously it can slow down and pick up, but that's easily 1,000 people a day, either near someone in drive through or inside the counter. Drive through people don't wear masks, and indoor people only do sometimes (not while eating, or drinking).
- Starbucks make people quarantine for 14-days if they might be "at risk" for COVID. Young kids can call out with COVID and get two weeks off that their manager cannot question in any way.
- The supply shortage means items are in poor supply and/or sold out and customers frequently take it out on the staff. This on top of all of the tension a normal person carries them daily.

All of those factors pile up and get worse for every person that quits/leaves/quarantines like a snowball rolling down hill. If a shift is already bad with 6 people working on it - it's about to get a whole lot worse when it's only 4 people. those 4 people will then go on to burn out faster, leaving 3, and so on.

It's a bad feeling, but it's primarily (IMO) the fact that retail has not innovated for it's employees in nearly a decade and now is on the back foot as people find themselves with other options (more money, better schedules, better benefits, etc). Starbucks, shockingly, is one of the better places to work (employees have some limited stock options, decent PTO, decent bennies) so it's got to be even worse for shittier places.

 

[Brazen Wanker]

Just found this thread and figured I'd add my 2 cents/trip report from yesterday's excursion to the grocery store. Location: California's capital city.

Produce section was fully stocked but the bread aisle had lots of glaring holes in the product. Some other aisles it was obvious the clerks were facing product only 2 boxes deep then several boxes wider than normal to intentionally take up shelf space, much like the corn meal pic from the last page of this thread. the biggest surprise was the meat department: There was no ground beef, at all. Even the expensive brand name organic free-range single-origin gluten free gender queer beef was sold out. All the chicken breasts were gone except for a few packages of Rocky brand chicken and that shit's nasty. Also the meat case with the high dollar shit like rib-eyes and tomahawk steaks had a bunch of empty space.

Keep in mind this was at an upscale chain supermarket. Usually stuff is available, even if you have to pay for it ($10/lb for ground beef, etc. ). I wonder what's happening at the grocery stories in the hood? I may have to check some of them out.

 

[Leaf Wage Slave]

Been a while since I’ve done my “Somewhat Central Canada” Walmart Update, but - shockingly, we aren’t as badly fucked as you lot seem to be down South. Hours are still regular hours and all.

The weird thing is that what food shortages we ARE getting, all seem rather temporary - to the point I’m just wondering if it’s people hoarding because our Covid numbers are spiking (least we aren’t as bad as Ontario or the bootleg French) and just clearing the shelves out faster than they can be stocked. I’m not sure if that’s due to Walmart Canada’s Supply Chain being less stressed due to the sheer difference in population, or if it’s actually cheaper for them to get produce/meat locally (tax breaks, the existence of Peak of the Market, etc.).

Though hilariously, the Gluten Free and Foreign Food sections are seemingly untouched. Funny how that works, innit?

 

[Sped Xing]

The food company I work for is seeing insane monster orders, but can't get enough employees in to make even close to the normal level of production, and their ingredients sources are having trouble keeping up with the reduced input levels.

I think everyone must be in the same boat, and these immense orders are people trying to find someone to fill the gaps.

 

[Brazen Wanker]

Though hilariously, the Gluten Free and Foreign Food sections are seemingly untouched. Funny how that works, innit?

Also, I know it's cliche at this point, but the Impossible "meats" are still readily available for some reason.

 

[young chestnut]

Went to two grocery stores yesterday and they both looked pretty good but for a few things. One had no onions or spaghetti noodles and the other had big gaps in the cracker, sports drink, cat food, and cold medicine sections. Meat section was mostly fine.

Pictures of second store:

 

[Non-breath oblige]

Early morning grocery store run report:

- Eggs section completely wiped
- Salads section completely wiped
- Tyson chicken products section completely wiped
- Waffles section completely wiped
- Frozen meals section completely wiped
- Bagel products looked okay at first but eerily no sign of generic brands
- Same with canned pasta

 

[Lathe]

Anybody hearing anything about the Kroger strike? I have a feeling things will get worse after their stockers are all out on strike.

 

[Lorne Armstrong]

Early morning grocery store run report:

- Eggs section completely wiped
- Salads section completely wiped
- Tyson chicken products section completely wiped
- Waffles section completely wiped
- Frozen meals section completely wiped
- Bagel products looked okay at first but eerily no sign of generic brands
- Same with canned pasta

Yeah, it sucks when the store isn’t totally sold out BUT they’re sold out of the store brand so the only choice you have is do without or pay the inflated premium price for the brand name.

As far as the eggs go, and I’m being absolutely serious here, look into keeping a few chickens in your backyard if you can possibly do so. 4-5 chickens is all you’d need to keep a family of 4 in all the eggs they’d need. Chickens have to mature to around 6 months of age before they start laying but once they do you’ll get 5-6 eggs a week out of each. After a few years when their production slows down, buy 5 new chicks, raise them up, and once the new girls are producing you process the old ones and stick them in the freezer for soups/stews/chicken&dumplings down the road.

As far as salads go, now’s the time to be planning on planting a garden in the spring. Not saying you can grow everything you eat, but everything you grow is one less thing you have to pay for.

 

[Butcher Pete]

Still no grocery store issues in Tokyo. No problems at the bakery, the butcher and seafood shops, the cakemaker, etc. Restaraunts and bars are all open. Import goods may be a little more expensive, but that’s it.

Of course, most places treat their employees like human beings and staff their stores accordingly. No one takes covid seriously, despite OMG RISING INFECTION RATES GUIZE—people are doing everything they did pre-pandemic, but with a mask. Or not.

I still have family in the US, some of whom have scaled back their work and lifestyles. They’ve found the Pareto point in their lives, putting forth the 20% of the effort that leads to the 80% of the results, and subsequently deciding that they don’t really need the other 20% of those results. It seems that a lot of people are finally recognizing the soul-destroying consumerist rat race for what it really is and are dropping out.

 

[Lisa Frank Abomination]

Still no grocery store issues in Tokyo. No problems at the bakery, the butcher and seafood shops, the cakemaker, etc. Restaraunts and bars are all open. Import goods may be a little more expensive, but that’s it.

Of course, most places treat their employees like human beings and staff their stores accordingly. No one takes covid seriously, despite OMG RISING INFECTION RATES GUIZE—people are doing everything they did pre-pandemic, but with a mask. Or not.

I still have family in the US, some of whom have scaled back their work and lifestyles. They’ve found the Pareto point in their lives, putting forth the 20% of the effort that leads to the 80% of the results, and subsequently deciding that they don’t really need the other 20% of those results. It seems that a lot of people are finally recognizing the soul-destroying consumerist rat race for what it really is and are dropping out.

Yeah, supermarkets are still fine here. There was one day where the entire prepared lettuce/cabbage bags were sold out at a bulk shop in my area though. Most leafy greens were gone too. It only lasted two days and now it's normal.

We've been hearing about dairy products getting more expensive but so far there hasn't been a significant difference from what I've observed.

The big thing to look out for are potatoes though.

 

[Butcher Pete]

We've been hearing about dairy products getting more expensive but so far there hasn't been a significant difference from what I've observed.

The big thing to look out for are potatoes though.

I think it’s just a virtue signal. I went to the Carl’s Jr. in Akihabara and they had no such restriction.

 

[Kuritan Deplorable]

I still have family in the US, some of whom have scaled back their work and lifestyles. They’ve found the Pareto point in their lives, putting forth the 20% of the effort that leads to the 80% of the results, and subsequently deciding that they don’t really need the other 20% of those results. It seems that a lot of people are finally recognizing the soul-destroying consumerist rat race for what it really is and are dropping out.

This is my great hope out of any potential wider depression from these issues - People realizing that consumerism, while actually a general net benefit, is the sort of thing that hits rapidly diminishing returns. Buying a nice phone can make a world of difference to the experience. Upgrading every 5 years will yield you significant advancements for a good price. Buying every iPhone every year is retarded and won't make your life any more enjoyable.

 

[Larry David's Opera Cape]

Had to actually go inside Target today, first time in months. Oof. They've been hit hard. I had seen a lot of photos around the country from Targets and wondered if mine would be just as bad and it sure was. The grocery section (pretty sizeable in this location) was wiped. Milk case almost stripped entirely bare. Produce had just been very artfully arranged to cover a lot of bare space (I saw the employee leaving with his cart.) Frozen food had more empty slots than full ones, and a guy was out with a cart trying to spread out what was there to look better. Cereal, crackers, all that boxed stuff was pretty wiped too.

The toy section was looking really bad and the cold remedy aisle was out of almost every variety of meds. The only part of the store that looked normal was the clothing.