Local grocery store looking a bit bare!

 Forsyth MO. - I've shopped at Country Mart since it opened some decades ago in Forsyth Missouri and so, I've grown pretty use to knowing what to expect to see on the shelves. Yet, over the past number of months, I've witnessed a marked change to fewer and fewer items to select from. 

When I've asked why some of the shelves have been mostly bare, in the past, I've been informed that it was to to 'supply chain disruptions'... Whatever that actually means. I had assumed they (they being management) were referring to disruptions due to the Covid-19 pandemic, currently in its 9th month! Disruptions that I had assumed would have worked themselves by now. But, they really haven't. As a matter of fact, they seemed to have gotten worse, at least at the Forsyth location. I found this strange, as the one other local market named Save A Lot didn't seem to  be suffering shortages quite as much!

So, I decided to investigate a bit more. One relevant article that I viewed back in March stated 'Supermarkets are rationing grocery-store staples and trying to restock more quickly to deal with surging demand, while planning new ways to feed a rising number of self-isolating consumers as coronavirus spreads across the U.S. and Europe.' I approached the owner of Save A Lot and asked him if this was still the case. Was increased hording still causing the shortages and why was his store so well stocked?

I was informed by a spokesperson for SAL that they too were have supply chain disruptions due to the impact that Covid-19 was having. She told me that right at that moment, obtaining canned vegetables was a challengs.

I expect shortages to remain a problem well into 2021.