Natural Disasters are regular occurrences in many parts of the world. The 8.9 magnitude earthquake in Japan this year was not the first to hit the area and will not be the last. The earthquake triggered a tsunami that ravaged the coastline and caused many deaths in addition to that of the earthquake. Many of these deaths could have been prevented if those living on the coast understood the real dangers of a tsunami after the earthquake. Instead, many of them returned to their homes to survey the damage and were at the mercy of violent 30 foot ocean waves.
Survival kits and food storage are essential to earthquake preparedness. But, knowledge and education on the dangers that can occur after an earthquake are crucial as well. Many of us were taught what to do in the event of an earthquake, but not much about what to do after the rumbling has subsided. There are some essential instructions on what to do after an earthquake that may seem like common sense, but more often than not, people are injured by not following these warnings.
Prepare for Aftershocks: For the first 48 hours or more expect aftershocks that may be stronger than the earthquake itself. Aftershocks can be more dangerous because structures have already become unstable.
Turn Off Gas, but Do Not Turn it Back On: Turn off any gas in buildings or homes. If there is a scent of gas or any type of odd hiss sounds, leave the building immediately. You must have a professional inspect the gas area even if you do not suspect a leak before turning the gas back on.
Don’t Let Curiosity Get the Best of You: In other words, stay away from damaged areas unless authorities have permitted admittance. Many people are injured or worse when they give into their curiosity and explore their communities.
There are many communities that now offer natural disaster preparedness courses. If your community does not offer this type of service, request it. Take initiative and create an emergency preparedness plan with your family and neighbors.
If you’ve tried to order freeze dried food storage recently, you’ve probably noticed that many suppliers are backed up in delivery and you may need to wait at least 6 weeks to get your order shipped. What is causing this shortage and will it get worse? Recently, Brian Neville wrote a letter to all Wise Company, Inc. customers. Wise Company, Inc. is one of the largest suppliers of US made freeze dried food storage and many prominent online stores, such as Preparewise.com and Wisefoodinsurance.com, carry their products.
Dear Valued Customer,
My name is Brian NeVille (President and CEO) with Wise Company, Inc. We are grateful for the opportunity to provide Wise product and services to each one of you individually. We pride ourselves on product quality and customer satisfaction.
Because of the recent occurrences (earth quakes, tsunamis, increase in food prices, inflation, demands on fuel, etc.) throughout the world, request for Wise product has increased dramatically.
This has put a sizeable stress, delay, and temporary shortage on all types of food products. Specifically, freeze dry, dehydrated, and dry raw-good commodities. We have chosen not to compromise our business by bringing in raw goods from outside of the United States. All Wise products will continue to be USA sourced and made.
Product requests and orders that in the past were shipped within 24 to 48 hours are now estimated at a shipping time of 6 to 8 weeks. We will continue to process orders in a first in and first out manner so it is important to keep the orders in the queue to ensure customers receive product as quickly as possible. Internal measures have and are being taken to address this temporary inconvenience and ensure success.
We will continue to send out status updates as needed. In the meantime, I am personally happy to address any additional questions or concerns you may have. We want to ensure your continued satisfaction. We appreciate your understanding and patience during this time.
Sincerely,
Brian NeVille
Wise Company Inc.
Another large provider of freeze dried is Oregon Freeze Dry AKA Mountain House. They supply sites like Emergency Essentials via Beprepared.com. Recently the sales manager for Oregon Freeze Dry sent out this e-mail:
This is an update on Oregon Freeze Dry’s #10 can situation. Because the demand for our #10 cans remains very high, we continue to be unable to meet all #10 can needs. OFD is allocating as much of our Production Capacity as possible to this market segment, while still allowing us to meet requirements in other markets.
Unfortunately, we cannot open sales to all previous dealers. We continue to sell allocated quantities to our long-time, largest customers/distributors.
We expect this situation to remain until at least this summer. At this point, we are not able to predict an actual date as to when we can open sales to all current dealers.
I wanted to share with you a recent company announcement to show that we are working on making improvements to be able to address these sudden increases in food storage demand. Our President, Jim Merryman, has signed off a multi-million dollar capital project to make some plant modifications that will increase our capacity. These modifications will start in May 2011 and we estimate the project to be complete by September 2011.
I know how difficult this situation is for each of you and your business. I truly feel your frustration and OFD is working incredibly hard to turn this situation around as quickly as possible.
Sincerely,
Oregon Freeze Dry, Inc.
Melanie Cornutt
Sales Manager, Retail
It looks as though the average American citizen is catching on and beginning to decide food storage is a good idea. Another popular explanation is that governments and wealthy groups are purchasing these products in bulk. Do some research on freeze dried storage shortage on Google and you will find some very interesting information. On top of that, there have been a myriad of natural disasters recently to spurn forward the idea of food storage.
Listed by date, here are a few of disasters that have happened so far in 2011: Major flooding in Brisbane, Australia, 6.3 magnitude earthquake in New Zealand, 8.9 massive earthquake in Japan and ensuing tsunami, major tornadoes in Southern United States. While it is impossible to foretell what the future holds, there is never a better time to prepare for the future than the present.
I have been listening to Glenn Beck off and on for the past few months, mostly in my car on my drive to work. I happen to really appreciate the man and what he is doing to warn people of coming problems and changes in our nation. Glenn Beck promotes food storage and gold investment. Strangely enough his conservative values, which are quite in sync with my own, are seen to many as being as extreme and radical. Oh well, I guess that comes with the territory and is similar to the scriptural prophecy of calling good bad, and bad good. People who are not in agreement with him will do anything possible to call his conservative views extreme, where in reality their own views are extreme.
Why does Glenn Beck promote food storage? Why does he have gold commercials on his program as well? Are these really radical concepts? What is so radical about food storage? I have food storage, you should too. It isn’t because we want the world to end and after it all goes up in smoke, we can pull out our gourmet freeze dried food storage and during our meal laugh at all of the carnage and destruction around us and say, “Ha ha, told you so… and I get a feast while the rest of you suffer.” No, that is not it. Food storage is to prepare for the “just in case”. There are some things that as people we really believe in strongly, and we say we hope we are wrong, and we really do want to be wrong. There are other things that we really believe in and we say we hope we are wrong, but we are still conflicted inside because we have an emotional attachment to our argument where we really cannot conceive of actually being wrong in any way, shape, or form. I think Glenn Beck really does want to be wrong about needing food storage, and I want to be wrong about ever needing food storage, because that could possibly mean that there may at some point in the future come a time where we cannot access speedily and conveniently (like we do now) whatever groceries we want whenever we want. And I or anyone else would have to be stupid to want for that to happen. So in this case, I don’t have an emotional attachment, and I don’t think Glenn Beck does either, about having to be right about needing food storage.
I hope people get it — I hope that they understand and that they get food storage just in case they ever need it, and for whatever reason. It is not very fun to speculate why food storage would be needed, let your individual imagination and inspiration help you to understand why it may be a necessity. I’m not here to paint gruesome doomsday pictures or suggest awful scenarios to scare you into buying food storage. In fact this is very much a common sense issue. Nobody should be coerced into buying food storage, they should each decide to get it on their own accord and feel good about their own decisions. The strange thing is that many won’t consider food storage because food, the material which sustains our very lives, is just taken for granted. But shouldn’t the very thing that sustains our lives have a pretty high priority, and shouldn’t we have plenty of it (more than necessary for the moment, in fact)? If we were going to battle we wouldn’t take for granted having enough (or adequate) arms and ammunition, because we know that without them we would be ill prepared to save our own lives and/or conquer the enemy. Yet, it is considered radical and extreme (by extremists themselves, I guess?) that anybody should want to have an adequate supply of food storage. Silly, why would you want to store food, something that could come in handy to what… save your life?
Thank you Glenn Beck for being a voice of warning about food storage, about gold, about political concerns. Unless you are hiding beneath a rock, it isn’t hard to conceptualize that there may be need of these things, and that our world is changing at an ever-increasing rate of speed. Food storage is anything but radical or extreme.
Food Storage could well be the most important investment decision you make all year. In fact, food storage could be one of the most important decisions you make for the comfort, safety, and survival of you and your loved ones in the years to come. Think of the warnings we are seeing to accumulate food storage much as you would the warning signals of the Tsunami in Thailand on that fateful day after Christmas in 2005. At that time, although there may not have been a warning signal such as a blaring siren for all to hear, or a prediction beforehand of imminent destruction, there were subtleties that if one knew what to watch for, they had every opportunity to get to higher ground. The warning signs came in the form of a receding ocean and frothing bubbles, as well as stranded fish and other sea life. The warning signs that we are now seeing to accumulate food storage are firmly entrenched. One of the best indicators of the need to acquire food storage is not only the instability we see in nature, but also the instability we currently are experiencing in the global political landscape and the global economy.
Food Storage to Become More Valuable Than Gold
We are fast approaching Thanksgiving, a time of showing our thankfulness and gratitude for all of the bounteous blessings that we have as a nation. We celebrate this and many other ocassions with food. It would be well for us instead of just gorging ourselves on food and thinking nothing more of it, to also slowly build up over time our food storage supplies and other neccesities that we will likely be in need of in the days to come. As of late, one of the subtle warning signs that indicate a need for food storage is the price of the precious metals. It has been said that precious metals are a guage or leading indicator of inflation. While this quite often the case, it is also more true that people are storing gold and silver because of political uncertainty. But surely gold and silver are sounding the alarm that prices of commodities (including your groceries) will be going up in the not-too-distant future, as the federal reserve wreaks havoc with the value of our money. The true definition of inflation is an increase in the money supply, but it follows that too much of an increase in the money supply causes prices to rise. Money cannot escape the law of supply and demand. Owning gold and silver will help you to survive the financial storms coming our way, the likes of which we have not even experienced a small portion of in comparison to what will come, and owning food storage will help you to survive physically. Firearms may become a necessity as well for the protection of life and liberties.
Food Storage and the Ten Virgins
If any person needs a better excuse to have food storage, this nudging or prompting may not come in time. Like the parable of the Ten Virgins, we can wait and procrastinate until it is everlastingly to late. Food storage will not be forced upon us. Those who are ill-prepared, but who’ve had the chance to get ready have no assurance. Those who have dutifully put their house in order and accumulated food storage by sacrifice and carefull attention will be rewarded with their very lives. Although the price of gold and silver will reach heights that none could fathom beforehand, the value of food storage will be way beyond any other tangible items. After adequate shelter, water is the most important thing for us to store. If you cannot store water, have a water filter that can eliminate bacteria, viruses, and protozoa. And have as much food storage as you possibly can. Find creative places for it. Honestly, how much would it put you out to thoughtfully and slowly gather foodstuffs for a good cause (your life and well-being)? You are not being called upon to right now stop everything you are doing to stockpile enough food storage for every member of your family to eat for one year. No, take it slowly, and as you can prudently acquire the food storage you will need over time.
The Food Storage Decision
The warning signs for food storage necessity are here. What need have we for any more warnings than we have already had? It’s simply a matter of deciding in one of three ways: either we decide that we will not get food storage (for whatever reason), and reap the consequences, we decide we will take on the responsibility and gather food storage, or we decide to be undecided. Undecided, however, is usually by default a decision not to. Take it to heart to get your food storage starting today. A can of whatever nonperishable good you choose can be a start, a symbol, and your motivation to move ahead in the right direction. Your food storage journey can and will gradually bring you more peace of mind.
The value of food storage and water storage is often overlooked. With the advancements of a modern age, and the shift from self reliance (growing your own food, making your own clothes, and fixing what is in need of repair), to interdependence, a very small percentage of people actually take the time (or spend the money) on storing food and water — simply because it is all seemingly so perpetually available, and in a capitalistic society, at such competitive prices.
Our world has become one of specialization. In the last century or so ever since credit has been made so plentiful and readily available, businesses have sprung up that can provide a person with everything he or she wants and more. Not having to do everything ourselves now, because there is surely some business segment that can do it for us cheaper and in a more timely manner than we could do it ourselves (usually), we have gradually forgotten or possibly never even learned some of the most basic survival skills. Being so specialized ourselves has not only afforded us the capability to become in demand to employers, but also to have room for more leisurely activities, since only having to get really good at a particular skill or skill set makes it so that we can have more money to spend on other things that the other “specializers” have to offer.
So now, in the name of convenience, efficiency, and leisure, we are lulled into a certain sense of security, and it becomes a “hardship” on us to have to even consider food and water storage. There are various and sundry distractions to keep us from having to deal with such a basic need that is at present provided for us in every way, shape and form imaginable. Besides that, why would the way things are now ever change, and we be somehow “thrown back” to yesteryear when members of society had to rely more fully on our own resources to feed themselves?
Thinking things will not change is very analogous to thinking that nothing bad could happen to me. It is very common to the human psyche. Disaster is always a distant thought, and one that doesn’t seem very pertinent to our present reality. It’s a bit like death. We know it is a possibility, but we don’t normally ruminate upon it, because that could hamper our progress. But we should not completely ignore it, either. And the heartache that follows misfortune of almost every kind is never worth the effort and/or resources that were not spent preparing and possibly preventing catastrophes, or at least preventing the worsening aftereffects. This is precisely why future possible disasters and catastrophic scenarios should be payed attention to — because they can happen. Not because they will necessarily, but that the value of being prepared for an event that would trigger the need for food storage and water storage is greater by far than the value of our time or money that could be spent elsewhere. Doesn’t the value of survival surpass any of our leisure activities and the value of other material things? Ironically, we need to survive to enjoy those things.
Food storage will help us to survive. It looks more and more likely all of the time that it will be needed at some point in our lifetimes. Events in our society that we could not have even imagined happening have already transpired. Truth is stranger than fiction. Food storage could become more valuable than anything tangible that you possess.
