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A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

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Re: A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

#61

Post by koyote »

Scoundreller wrote: post #25
dx87 wrote: post #5

That's actually how a lot of businesses in rural parts of Alaska work, even places that don't require a boat or plane to access. My dad lives right off the highway in a small town in Alaska, and the closest thing to a grocery store is an old airplane hanger that one of the locals runs a general store out of. The owner makes weekly trips to Costco, which is ~4 hours away, and buys as much as they can fit into a big U-…

Rural Croatia too, except it’s a truck that comes to all of the villages 3x/week with staple items. Plays ridiculously stereotypical Croatian music through a loudspeaker to announce his arrival. And then a meat truck once a week and a fish truck more irregularly. Took requests as well. I think of it like villages having Amazon Prime starting in the late 90s.

That's interesting!

I would have thought Croatia to be small enough to not need such a system; i.e. supermarkets not further than half an hour drive away.

Or is it just a matter of convenience?

Re: A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

#62

Post by LyndsySimon »

matthewowen wrote: post #47
MattGaiser wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone is buying a mega bag thinking that they will now suddenly do a lot of baking. My mother did this. My grandmother did this. Many of my 23 year old friends did this. They end up baking one loaf and then just forgetting about it in the pantry, but they bought a 20 lb bag because of how much they expected to bake.

I don't think I've ever seen a 20lb bag of flour in a grocery store. That's a really big bag. That's about 4 gallons by volume. My wife bought a 50lb bag today: our local bakery buys that size for their own purposes. It's a good sized sack. I do not think there are many people out buying 20lb bags of flour.

We bought 40lb of flour and 20lb of sugar in early March; it was one of our last “preps” going into all this. We don’t normally go through either in any quantity - my wife and are both usually on keto. We’ve used all the flour (and have bought more), and most of the sugar.

We got both at our local Walmart.

Re: A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

#63

Post by CrazyStat »

bigiain wrote: post #33
pengaru wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On what planet does anybody pivot to eating home-baked bread without consuming substantially more of it?

If it works, it's delicious and you end up eating heaps more than usual. If your first two or three attempts a baking bread fail, then you end up becoming one of those people with 85% of a 20lb bag of flour in the cupboard waiting for the weevils to move in... (The temp calibration on my oven is way out. Doesn't matter too much for roasting chickens or cooking lasagne, but baking is more temperamental than that, and…

You can get an oven thermometer for like $3, unless those have also sold out.

Re: A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

#64

Post by groby_b »

TylerE wrote: post #24
phil21 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've looked into this, and it seems pretty much down to the retail vs. commercial packaging and the assorted supply chains. Both the packaging materials themselves, as well as the plant capacity to pack a bunch of 5lb bags of flour vs. giant 50 or 100lb bags a baker would pick up. I'm sure FDA labeling requirements/etc. are likely different as well so it's not quite as simple as "find a few trucks worth of burlap bag…

I remember reading a similar article about disinfecting wipes - the bottleneck is actually in the plastic containers, not the wipes, and so a few companies have started packaging them in bags like baby wipes.

Except... they were available in bags pre-Covid, too.

Re: A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

#65

Post by groby_b »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #37
mcny wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Add in all the waste of every 23 year old who has never baked in their life buying 20lbs of flour to go bad in their pantry and things. How quickly does processed flour go bad? I’d imagine as long as you store in a dry, air-tight box, it should be ok?

How many 23-year-olds know to do that? How many are going to remember, and actually do it?

Unless they bought a single 20 lbs bag, or they open all four bags, they have 15 lbs stored airtight and dark by default.

Also, I hear kids these days occasionally use the Internets to learn how to do things.

But even if you open them all and let them sit on a counter, you get at least several months out of them unless you get insects in there. And if that happens, trust me, you've learned a life-long lesson.

Re: A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

#66

Post by grecy »

9nGQluzmnq3M wrote: post #60
grecy wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(I live in the Yukon) It's extremely common to zip down to Juneau to go shopping and then hop back to the Yukon. It's just a 10 hour one way trip, and when you live in the North that's not so far. Tons of people go there simply to go to Costco (which doesn't exist in the Yukon) It's also really nice to go in winter when it's -40C/F in the Yukon (all inland) and usually right around freezing in Juneau (coastal)

> It's just a 10 hour one way trip Spoken like a true Canadian. (Edit: Oops!)

Yukoner.

The Yukon is in Canada.

Re: A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

#67

Post by Spooky23 »

notyourday wrote: post #34
joncp wrote: post #10

The scarcity of flour, especially bread flour piques my curiosity. I haven't heard about anyone eating vastly more bread than before the quarantine. It's just that everyone is making it at home instead of buying it with meals at restaurants. One would expect the flour not being shipped to the restaurants would be redirected into the retail supply chain but that doesn't appear to be the case. The only explanations I c…

> . One would expect the flour not being shipped to the restaurants would be redirected into the retail supply chain but that doesn't appear to be the case. So I have friends that are reasonably known restaurateurs who obviously shut down their restaurants. I was talking to them about the logistics and the issues with the supply chain. It was rather eye opening to me. TL;DR : the problem with the supply chain is that…

They pay more to Sysco for trade credit and delivery. When you buy at a restaurant depot type place, prices are similar to a Costco for unfinished cuts.

As for the supply of meat, expect that to change. In upstate NY most cuts of beef are gone and trimmed chicken is either not in stock or sold before noon.

Re: A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

#68

Post by smnrchrds »

notyourday wrote: post #56
chii wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i find it hard to believe that restaurants pay more than retail for the same goods.

You can create an account on most of the restaurant supply services and place pre-paid orders. You would be shocked at the pricing ( there would be a minimum order value as well )

Why do they do it then? Why won't they simply buy retail?

Re: A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

#69

Post by kohtatsu »

Marsymars wrote: post #2

I visited Dawson City in the Yukon last year and was surprised to see Kirkland Signature goods on sale at the general store. Didn't think to ask how they got there.

If anyone else is visiting the Yukon soon hit me up I'm lonely ;)

Re: A man feeding a remote Alaska town with a Costco card and a ship

#70

Post by pinkorchid »

koyote wrote: post #61
Scoundreller wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rural Croatia too, except it’s a truck that comes to all of the villages 3x/week with staple items. Plays ridiculously stereotypical Croatian music through a loudspeaker to announce his arrival. And then a meat truck once a week and a fish truck more irregularly. Took requests as well. I think of it like villages having Amazon Prime starting in the late 90s.

That's interesting! I would have thought Croatia to be small enough to not need such a system; i.e. supermarkets not further than half an hour drive away. Or is it just a matter of convenience?

A very similar system is also common in small towns (population in the low hundreds or fewer) in Spain. Every few days a baker will come driving their van and selling bread, or a truck with fruit, etc. Even doctors and priests follow a similar pattern.

It's likely that one could drive for 30 minutes and find an even better selection. That assumes car ownership and the ability to drive, which is not widespread in the aging population in rural areas.

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