A Glimmer of Civility in California

With hoarding stories like this one in America and this one in Canada, it’s easy to lose faith in humanity. But yesterday at a Costco in suburban San Francisco, I witnessed civility and patience as people who wanted toilet paper, paper towels, and bottled water had to line up in a long line that started near the entrance and ended up in the far corner of the store. There was a limit of one large package of toilet paper, one large package of paper towels, and two cases of water. The few a$$holes who took more than this had them removed from their carts when they tried to checkout.


     

34 Replies to “A Glimmer of Civility in California”

  1. I had a similar experience at Costco in Ottawa. The store was jam packed with people. I can’t say people were anxious or panicked, looking at people’s carts, I would say they were stocking up to stay home for two weeks. A lot of people were buying lots of toilet paper. I think Costco should have limited purchases to one or two per customer. Then again, perhaps they don’t mind given the brisk business it generates and have more on order because they know more people will be coming back for this vital supply.

    Most people were quite patient and joking around in the long line up. The simple, market-based solution for people like this is for the store to limit the number of quantities. Then again, CTC managed to sell-out their entire stock so it may not matter to them.

    1. Good luck with maintaining the recommmended ‘social distance’ in a panic line-up. Definitely not the place to be!

  2. There are lineups at all the big stores here in the east end of Toronto. I went to a little mom-and-pop variety store for a newspaper. Lots of hand sanitizer and wipes on the counter, and toilet paper and food on the shelves. I get the impression that Korean guy would love to see his inventory wiped out.
    If you can’t find what you’re looking for this may be an idea for you to try.

    1. When I was met with mile-radius traffic jam around MY suburban San Francisco COSTCO … I turned around and went to my local Boutique Grocery store – Diablo Foods. Not quite the Korean grocer on the market … but the shelves were stocked and delivery trucks lined up in the loading dock. And the OWNER was helping check out shoppers rapidly by keeping the checkstands organized and running smoothly.

      I checked out with a Newly-hired checker who had forgotten the code for Romaine lettuce. This store is so customer oriented that they have a highly experienced team of baggers … yes, employees who ensure your bags are filled as fast as things come down the belt. Their baggers are not JUST baggers … and the highly experienced, knowledgeable bagger gave the new checker the correct code for Romaine.

      You gotta LOVE small business … even IF their goods cost slightly more

  3. The simple, market-based solution for people like this is for the store to limit the number of quantities.

    That may be simple, and it may actually be a solution. But rationing isn’t a “market based” system.

  4. Went by the local store of a hardware chain on Sat to stock up on welding electrodes and TIG rods, to not be caught empty-handed if SHTF.
    The store still has face masks, though in small, expensive packages. We wore masks, no one else did. The few shoppers, above 40 mostly, looked at us as if we were from Mars. We took the most common welding consumables, a couple of packs of each. Also bought earplugs since mine are more than 15 years old. The panicking crowds are truly pathetic, since they only know of department stores.
    Next stop is the local farm supply. I was at one last week but they either sold out all their winter seeds or have not yet gotten the spring ones. It was empty when I came and only one farmer came in in the 20 min that I was there.
    Truly the majority of Canadians have no idea what life really is. I am not that old, but I have been looking at Canadians with disbelief for quite some time. Does anyone of you have any idea of how one takes water from a well and carries it home in two buckets? Or how to dig a well? Or how to use a scythe to harvest hay for farm animals? How to make a scythe? “Nah, don’t need that. Where is my smartphone?”

    1. “ how to use a scythe to harvest hay for farm animals”

      Swing at the hips, don’t swing the arms.

    2. Lol, grandfather did all that, when he came to Alberta in ought 9 (that’s 1909 for the kiddies).. Don’t forget, using a team of horses to break the land!
      Grandma carried the water from the creek, used to joke that’s why she was bow legged! The only thing the government gave them, was the opportunity to either freeze or starve to death! I listened closely to all their stories..
      So, TLDR: YES, I do!

        1. Yes, and I can read too, see above’s TLDR..
          You think I never spent time at the farm doing these things? My grands never went into a home, died on the farm, each almost 100 yrs old, married for 70 of them, yes only to each other.. My aunts and uncles lived on the farm too, showed me other useful things..
          I also know how to do other stuff too, like Tig weld, build houses, operate and maintain equipment, make beer, reload ammunition, shoot, hunt, etc etc..
          Might have to soon post one’s CV here as a FAQ for others to save time and server space..

        1. Does the fear of corona virus also affect reading comprehension?
          “when he came to Alberta in ought 9 (that’s 1909 for the kiddies).. ”
          I realize I’m a relatively new poster, (past few years) long time reader, though .
          Am I cool enough to hang with you people, in your fort?
          Lol!

    3. Don’t worry.

      Your Liberal Glozi government can’t wait to return your lifestyle to the 1800s.

    4. Checked off yes to every box.

      I also know how to harness a team of horses and drive them. I can hunt and butcher animals.

      I’m not sure it’s going to come to that but there is one big correction coming.

  5. Fun fact.
    The shelves are empty because the staff can’t get into the isle to restock the shelves.
    They have inventory, it’s just coming off the shelves faster than they can stock it.

    1. All of our local stores are trimming their OPEN hours … just to buy more time for stocking shelves. When I was at my local Safeway on Friday EVERY aisle had boxes and “stockboys” blocking the aisles.

      This too shall pass … and I expect a return to NORMAL next week. I might even reattempt my trip to COSTCO (nope. don’t need tp or hand sanitizer).

  6. The police were out in force at 6:00 am today at the Wegmans (a supermarket chain) I frequent in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, which is just a 10 minute drive from Philadelphia. I sometimes go there at right about that time on a weekend, so it wasn’t an effort by me to get there before the masses and hoard a whole bunch of items. I was just buying bananas and OJ, but there was definitely a contingent of people there who were intending to hoard some items. I went to a Walmart yesterday and the shelves were pretty much bare of most items. Never seen anything like it before in my 52 years.

    1. Me neither, but is a symptom of today’s society.

      No long term planning, only focused on tomorrow, little financial smarts, other than “I’m still under my limit/there’s still a few bucks in the account, I need smokes”

      My routine started years ago, when I was underemployed, times were tough, had no availability to lines of credit, had no credit card, was just another urban kid, living in an apartment, trying to get by with few commitments, while always working on trying to get the next better job.

      Know your prices! Only buy stuff on sale, a REAL sale, and then buy some quantity. Know your favourite stores with the best prices. Know that the same stuff goes on sale, in the same frequency (once a month, every six weeks, etc). This allows a healthy rotation of different foods and never being out of almost everything. We practice this to this very day. It means a visit to 4 or 5 stores on our trip, largely sticking to the list at each store, sometimes picking up some bargains here and there. VIsit Costco for the minimum, dairy, greens, maybe a chicken, sirloin, ground, and maybe a discounted item that week. That’s why this hoarding looks positively stupid and ineffective, few have learned anything in life. I figure I’ve saved thousands over the years by food shopping smartly.

      My wife says her style in her old life, used to be like everyone else. Visit one store. Throw what you think you need in the cart. Price? Shrug, we need it……..

  7. My neighbour runs one of those small town grocery stores where everything is double what you pay at Costco. We had some long talks about this virus in late January/early February. He started quietly stocking up on N95 masks, regular masks, toilet paper, hand sanitizer, disinfecting wipes, bleach, rubbing alcohol, the works. He also began education sessions for the seniors who come in for coffee every morning and explaining hand washing and how virus spread and why seniors are at the worst risk. He advised them mid February he would be doing a lock down on the morning coffee and instore services when “it gets here”. He informed everyone that he will do deliveries to their doors in town instead of them having to come into the store. He now has people driving in from the big city to buy his toilet paper, at a very substantial mark up and in limited quantities. Locals he knows get a special reduced price. He told me as of yesterday he has already paid for all the extra expenses he incurred and is banking lots of money for when the peak hits.

    1. Smart guy. More people will be hurt in the long run by the Panicdemic, in all it’s forms, than by the virus itself.

  8. A situation like this was a perfect opportunity for people with common sense and foresight to get rich at the expense of idiots who thought it was racist to stop foreigners with unsanitary habits to enter their countries.

    After all, corporate America and Canada has been getting rich at the expense of such people for decades.

    You’d wonder why it became a problem when normal people saw the opportunity to make enough to retire on, if you didn’t know better.

  9. No worries peoplekind, Trudeau is safe in his bunker.

    Lackeys with guns paid by the Canadian taxpayer will commandeer anything Blackie needs from Costco and hand deliver it to his kitchen and personal chef.

  10. I don’t understand the panic toilet paper hoarding. Since when is the Wuhan virus a pooping disease? I’ve searched the web and found no recipes for eating TP. If I run out of toilet paper and cannot go out, I have two showers as a back up. It is insane to hear people are fighting over bottled water. Fun fact, drinking water is easily accessible from the kitchen tap.
    If I stock up on anything, it will be food and wine.

    1. There was panicky buying of alcohol at the local LCBO. Just saying. The pharmacy had no rubbing alcohol too. I wonder what they are hoping for. One cannot get rid of the modern bitterness additive by distillation since it is volatile. It will still taste moldy.

  11. Soon they will have nothing to poop out unless they start eating their TP. They just do not know that yet. And then they will blame the farmers.

  12. Trying to figure out what’s going on in the general public’s ignorant degenerate little brains, I’ve concluded that they (sort of) think that maybe they will be locked in/forced to stay indoors by the national socialists and, meekly obeying, they will shelter in place inside their homes for weeks, surviving on what they’ve horded, until eventually permitted to go out and forage for more sustenance. Sometimes it seems like I am a Sovereign Individual with Inalienable Rights and Freedoms surrounded by slaves and zombies.

  13. The Canadian populace, enthusiastically encouraged by the “intelligentsia”, elected and re-elected The Dope.

    The prognosis is not good.

    Dead country walking.

  14. I went to the south-east Costco in ‘Toon yesterday, bought gas but the car park was so full I didn’t go into the store. Back this morning to gas up a family member’s car, it didn’t look so bad, I went in. They were screening at entry. “Paper products?” Well, we’re not quite out, but I buy their 30 roll pack of toilet paper when the last one is nearly gone, (which takes our small household long enough that I don’t keep track of how often that is,) so I said yes. At that they direct you on a route marshalled by staff to the back and will place one pack on your cart for you, and if you want more you can buy one pack of a dozen rolls of Purex.

    It’s a good thing, at this point, they can get more, it’s just panic people hoarding that clear the shelf and they can’t restock, so people who perhaps find it difficult to shop other than on the weekend can’t replenish their normal needs.

    Perhaps another good thing may come from this flap, that maybe a significant number of people will hear a wake up call and think about how vulnerable our economy is, how easy their life is and, and how complacent they have been. But as I read history, it won’t surprise me if we are too far gone down the road to decadence, degeneracy, and the fall.

  15. I am near Portage La Prairie Manitoba …. small city about 13,000 pop , rural non-panicking type of folks …..

    HOWEVER …. Saturday I went shopping at our fairly large WalMart and many of the food shelves are bare ….. no sugar , no flour , no pickles , no bread , no hand sanitizer , no rubbing alcohol disinfectant , no toilet paper , all the dry pastas and spaghetti is gone (they normally have a huge selection) …. natives have bought all the Pepsi and chips

    So I ended up at our smaller local grocery stores to get what I needed and the owner said he has doubled staff just to keep the shelves full . They are worried about being able to get more stock next week.

    And we are about as far away from the source of the flu as you can get ….. all meetings , public gatherings , hockey and sports games , and schools are all shut down .

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