Visiting a local grocery store over the past 36 hours has definitely had an ‘end of days’ feel.
Since Thursday’s announcement that a Barrie man had tested positive for COVID-19, Midland, Penetanguishene and Victoria Harbour stores have been busy with shoppers hungrily grabbing up supplies.
“There was a fight at Wal-Mart over toilet paper,” Midland resident Steve Martin said while shopping for food at a local store. “It’s a hoot.”
Checkout lines were also longer than area residents are used to experiencing. As an example, Friday morning saw Food Basics’ shoppers lined up to the back of the store near the dairy section with their purchases as they waited to have their items scanned.
Store shelves also appeared to be emptying quicker than employees could stack them with vacant spaces left where ‘hot-ticket items’ like hand sanitizer and toilet paper could once be found.
“It’s probably only busy because people are in a panic,” Penetanguishene resident Glenn Vivian said as he placed an item in his cart while shopping at No Frills.
“I only have five things on my list, but I’m sure it will take awhile. It seems the more they put in the media about this, the more people are panicking. At Wal-Mart, they had five skids of toilet paper and they were gone in two hours. It is media-driven hype.”
A cashier at No Frills told a gentleman packing his groceries that if he was looking for a job, he could probably start right away.
“It’s been crazy,” she said. “We had a big lineup of people waiting to get in this morning.”
Parking lots were also chock full as spaces became a premium commodity, which likely left some retailers thinking they were dealing with Black Friday crowds and not Friday the 13th shoppers.
While the strong winds and ominously dark skies Friday likely didn’t help some not consider the ‘end’ scenario (if even just for a few seconds), most shoppers seemed to take the longer than normal lines in stride.
And with the Midland LCBO outlet just a stone’s throw away from where he was shopping, Vivian joked, “since I can’t find hand sanitizer, maybe I’ll just use alcohol instead.”
