Rice limits in warehouse stores?

[Manedwolf]

Well. That's something I've never heard of in the US before. Huh.

Worried about rising prices worldwide, customers have been stocking up, prompting Sam's Club to limit sales to no more than four bags. Costco is considering a similar move.
By Jerry Hirsch, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
11:56 AM PDT, April 23, 2008
The global run on rice has hit U.S. shores but appears limited to big-box warehouse stores. Customers concerned about rising rice prices have been cleaning out the shelves at Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s Sam's Club and Costco Wholesale Corp. stores.

Sam's Club said today that customers will no longer be allowed to purchase more than four bags of jasmine, basmati and long-grain white rice per visit. The policy involves only bags of 20 pounds or larger and does not affect consumer packages.

The retailer said the policy was "effective immediately" across all of its U.S. stores.. It blamed the new limits on "supply and demand trends" and said it is working with suppliers "to ensure we are in stock, and we are asking for our members' cooperation and patience."

Earlier this week, Costco said it has seen sales spikes for flour, rice and some cooking oils and was considering limiting sales in stores where it had limited supplies. The chain said it is considering limiting the number of pallets a customer could purchase rather than stopping sales altogether.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-rice24apr24,1,3902221.story

Flour's up, I know that. Was $4.59 for 5lbs of King Arthur Bread Flour in the market the other day!

[Firethorn]

I figure that the only people concerned enough about the price of rice to worry about a spike eat huge amounts of it, and are somewhat penny pinchers.

If you're going to stock up, why not do it the cheapest way possible - with big bags from the big discount stores?

/has a 20 pound bag at home.  Should last me over a year.

[Manedwolf]

Well, a lot of smaller mom and pop restaurants buy their supplies from the warehouse stores as well.

[The Annoyed Man]

We're becoming more and more like the old soviet union.  Pretty soon we'll be standing in line to buy a potato.

[MillCreek]

There was an article in today's (4/23/08) Seattle Times about this.  The local Costco stores closest to downtown Seattle cannot keep bulk rice in stock.  Many local Asian restaurant owners buy their rice from Costco, and there seems to be a West Coast shortage of rice in the 25 and 50 pound bag. 

[charby]

We're becoming more and more like the old soviet union.  Pretty soon we'll be standing in line to buy a potato.

not at my house, I'll be digging mine out of the ground.

[Bogie]

Might be more in line with folks are eating more rice than they were before - "stretching" food, you know?
 
Plus, with the influx of Mexican and Chinese folks, the food system is going to see a different blend of stuff being consumed. They also noted that flour and cooking oil were both up - Can you say "tortillas?"
 

[Devonai]

Bah, this is just hyping a fake demand for Rice before she declares herself McCain's '08 running mate.

[Manedwolf]

We're becoming more and more like the old soviet union.  Pretty soon we'll be standing in line to buy a potato.

not at my house, I'll be digging mine out of the ground.

Do you have a potato digger?

[mfree]

"involves 20 pound bags"

Nifty way to get around saying the limit is four.... EIGHTY POUNDS OF RICE PER CUSTOMER oh my GOD we're rationing and we're going to starve to death!

No kidding, I've never seen anything so spun in my life.

[Firethorn]

Nifty way to get around saying the limit is four.... EIGHTY POUNDS OF RICE PER CUSTOMER oh my GOD we're rationing and we're going to starve to death!

I love that it's actually '20 pounds or larger'.  Find, say, 50 pound bags and you're up to 200 pounds per visit.

Probably the discount stores have a contract, they can't get more bags without a new contract at a higher price and want to keep availability up for all the customers while keeping prices low.

[Manedwolf]

"involves 20 pound bags"

Nifty way to get around saying the limit is four.... EIGHTY POUNDS OF RICE PER CUSTOMER oh my GOD we're rationing and we're going to starve to death!

No kidding, I've never seen anything so spun in my life.

Do you have any idea how much rice a Chinese restaurant might go through in a week?

Where do you think they get the rice, if they're not part of a chain with a distributor?

Ah-ha!

[charby]

We're becoming more and more like the old soviet union.  Pretty soon we'll be standing in line to buy a potato.

not at my house, I'll be digging mine out of the ground.

Do you have a potato digger?

If there is a true food shortage I might have to get me a potato digger to keep the theives out of my garden.

[Scout26]

Okay, explain to me how converting Corn into Ethanol causes a "rice shortage" ??

[Manedwolf]

Okay, explain to me how converting Corn into Ethanol causes a "rice shortage" ??

It hasn't. The droughts in Australia have caused a rice shortage.

A wheat shortage has been caused, though, by farmers changing their yearly crop from wheat to more-lucrative feed corn for ethanol production. Can't blame the farmers, but the whole idea was flawed from the beginning. If we want to make ethanol, we should be making it from agricultural waste, not literally growing food to burn.

[coppertales]

I was in Sam's Club yesterday and they had plenty of white rice, 20 and 50 lb sacks.  I was looking for that Indian rice, in the burlap bag, but they did not have any.  I found it later at Kroger, cheaper, no less.  I will hit the Vietnamese store this weekend, I am out of Jasmine rice......chris3

[MillCreek]

Over the past couple of days, there have been articles in both Seattle papers about this.  We don't have much in the way of Sam's Clubs up here, but we have more Costco stores than you can shake a stick at.  In a nutshell, the run on rice up here is primarily due to the local Asian restaurant owners stocking up in anticipation of increased prices or shortages.  Some of the restaurant owners were buying the 50 lb sacks of CalRose rice by the pallet load. 

[mbt2001]

I moved this from thr...  This if for y'alls info. 

I am sure that all of you have seen the increase in the price of Ammo because of the increased cost of copper, lead and the declining dollar. Those same factors combined with the credit crunch (home implosion whatever you want to call it), bio fuels, increased global demand, high fuel prices and product shortfalls (drought, storms, crop failures) have put us into a position of having short falls in the food supply.

The below is reports in the news. These are only a few. Odd that it is being reported a bit more by UK outlets than ours...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/apr/23/usa2
http://www.thetrumpet.com/index.php?q=5065.3338.0.0
http://www.dailyreckoning.co.uk/econ...end-00104.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...847.html?r=RSS
http://www.connpost.com/ci_9033782?source=rss

It doesn't just stop at grains... Cows eat grain, hogs eat grain...

Be prepared for a tough summer folks.

[Manedwolf]

As to other grains, I'd just poked in Stop n' Shop for some stuff.

5lbs of bread flour is now $4.99.

[PTK]

5lbs of bread flour is now $4.99

WOW, I just picked up two bags for $0.83/ea... I also picked up whole wheat flour for $1.13/5lbs.

Bought 10lbs of pinto beans for $6, on the low end of the regular $0.60-$0.80/lb, cooking oil for $2.00/qt, which is also average. I buy my rice in 11kg bags for $4.50-$6.00 depending on type.

Why are newspapers hyping this BS?

[mbt2001]

"involves 20 pound bags"

Nifty way to get around saying the limit is four.... EIGHTY POUNDS OF RICE PER CUSTOMER oh my GOD we're rationing and we're going to starve to death!

No kidding, I've never seen anything so spun in my life.

The problem is that it is April.  If they are rationing 20lb bags of rice in April, what will they be doing August September?  Thailand is considering halting their export of Rice.  India already has, they only export the highest quality at the moment.  They have halted export of edible oils....  

Rice has gone from $250 - 300 per Metric Ton to close to $900.00....  Do you think that happened because everything is OK?  Wheat, corn, rice and other grains are about to get harder to find, that means, beef, pork and Chicken are going to get a lot more expensive.  

[PTK]

As I just posted in another thread, I think this is all hype.

I just picked up two bags of bread flour (5lb) for $0.83/ea... I also picked up whole wheat flour for $1.13/5lbs.

Bought 10lbs of pinto beans for $6, on the low end of the regular $0.60-$0.80/lb, cooking oil for $2.00/qt, which is also average. I buy my rice in 11kg bags for $4.50-$6.00 depending on type, but today it was on sale for $4.00 even for 11kg of basmati rice.

Why are newspapers hyping this BS?

[Zardozimo Oprah Bannedalas]

Bah, this is just hyping a fake demand for Rice before she declares herself McCain's '08 running mate.

LOL - good one.

[mbt2001]

I read that...

Without knowing more about your location I can't tell you much, but it will start in the Urban centers and on the coasts, which the news papers have covered and what they are focusing on. 

As far as I know, this is the FIRST TIME ever that the U.S. has "rationed" anything (save WWII) even informaly.  Also, it is expected to get worse.  Mom and Pop shops will be less affected in the beginning than the larger retailers...  Remember, this only just started happening.

[PTK]

I live just outside Denver, CO. It doesn't get much more urban than that.