Opinion : Has the world gone ‘toilet roll crazy’?
As the world is coming to grips with the Covid-19 Coronavirus pandemic my good self is watching on in bewilderment.
It seems some people have resorted to panic buying certain items, like toilet roll, leaving empty shelves in supermarkets across the country. Indeed the last time yours truly went to a supermarket, which was a few days ago now, the shelves were empty where once they were full of toilet rolls.
But why? Why did people rush to the supermarkets, where there were other shoppers who may potentially already have the Coronavirus, to buy a few packs of bog roll? Is having a large stock of rolls of 2-ply paper worth risking exposure to others who may have the virus?
Perhaps one of the first symptoms of having the virus is a desire to spend money stockpiling toilet rolls?
The thing about modern supermarkets is they don’t actually have that much stock on the shelves compared with the number of shoppers who visit each week. It’s all about a ‘just in time’ supply chain and regular re-filling of the shelves thus a slight rush on a particular item will be sure the result in empty shelves.
It seems that the world has gone toilet roll crazy, indeed the tweet below appeared on the Official Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency Twitter page :
This van driver was taking stocking up on toilet and kitchen rolls to the extreme 🧻🚛
We stopped this vehicle at Blackwall Tunnel and found it was more than a tonne overweight😲
The driver is £300 lighter from the fine we issued him. Keeping you safe 👍 #toiletrollcrisis pic.twitter.com/mbiLqEjJqf
— Driver & Vehicle Standards Agency (@DVSAgovuk) March 11, 2020
So I hear you ask if my good self has bought any extra toilet rolls? Well, yes actually I did, after all it would be particularly unpleasant if one were to run out.
However instead of rushing out to a supermarket your humble servant asked a friend to help me place an order with an on-line supplier who, a few days later, duly sent an articulated lorry to deliver a couple of pallets of rolls to my ancestral home. I must say the lorry driver was particularly nifty operating the fork lift he used to unload my goods from the lorry and they even gave me a discount on the order for making a bulk purchase!
Most of my rolls have been put away in what was a disused room in the north wing of my ancestral home, however there are still a couple of hundred that my good self still has to find space for.
Surely having a good supply of food is as important, if not more important, than a stockpile of t-rolls?
But why go to the large supermarkets when there are lots of small corner shops in the town that still have supplies of the much sought after rolls of paper?
But if you do run out of paper then please be careful. A friend of mine did run out and was unable to buy more due to the shortage in the shops. So thinking it a good idea they resorted to using some cut-up newspaper in the bathroom. Indeed they had a smirk on their face as they told me of their seeming ingenious idea.
However the next day my friend phoned me up asking to borrow my set of drain clearing rods. It seems my friend had flushed the newspaper which caused a nasty blockage in their drainage system….
What do you think?
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