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Retailer warns of 'shortage of goods' as global supply chain disruption continues

Wed, Jun 16th 2021, 08:10 AM
Business Nassau Guardian Stories

The owner of a major retail store cautioned Bahamians yesterday not to wait to buy necessary items, since a shortage of goods will inevitably drive prices up over the coming months.

The global supply chain disruption has become so critical that the Biden Administration last week announced the creation of a special task force to reduce supply chain vulnerabilities and to focus on areas where a mismatch between supply and demand has been noted over the past several months.

Trevor Davis, the co-owner of Quality Home Centre, said there’s not just a shortage of food and grocery supplies internationally, given that shipping companies around the world are backed up, causing delays.
“All of those western ports, when you’re talking about suppliers, are not moving things off the ships fast enough. When they can’t get off the ships fast enough they can’t get onto the railroads and get into the other cities across America, where we normally do our sourcing from,” he told Guardian Business.
“So there is a backup of supply, causing a shift in supply and demand right now and hopefully when everybody gets back to work in America, we will see a shift and everything will be normalized. They expect it to be normalized before Christmas, so hopefully that’s what happens, but there is a shortage of goods. So if you see something and you need it you should buy it, because before the prices go down they are going to go back up because of supply and demand.”
The US is The Bahamas’ biggest trade partner, with 81.3 percent of total imports, a value of $2.7 billion. It’s challenges with supply chains therefore heavily impact The Bahamas.
Retailers throughout the country, still resurging from the impact of COVID-19 emergency orders on their businesses, have lamented the challenge of maintaining pre-pandemic stocks as commerce returned to the country. Davis said this means that Bahamian consumers have to be more strategic about their shopping, while still supporting local businesses.
“What Bahamian shoppers should do is shop early. It’s unpredictable now, but the basic stuff that you need for back to school, get them as early as possible so that you can also give your supplier some time to see what is going to move. Bahamians have the last-minute syndrome, where we wait until the last minute to buy things. If you wait, the supply may be low and the supplier can’t replenish in time before the schools open,” he said.
“This is similar to what happened last year with desks for homeschooling. Because they took so long to buy it everybody ran out. We’re not just competing with just us here in The Bahamas. It’s a global market, all the other Caribbean islands are affected. Even Florida is affected by what we are affected by in a lot of cases, because a lot of persons buy out of Florida and by the time the containers reach from the West Coast down to Florida, it still has an affect on us.”

The global supply chain disruption has become so critical that the Biden Administration last week announced the creation of a special task force to reduce supply chain vulnerabilities and to focus on areas where a mismatch between supply and demand has been noted over the past several months.

Trevor Davis, the co-owner of Quality Home Centre, said there’s not just a shortage of food and grocery supplies internationally, given that shipping companies around the world are backed up, causing delays.

“All of those western ports, when you’re talking about suppliers, are not moving things off the ships fast enough. When they can’t get off the ships fast enough they can’t get onto the railroads and get into the other cities across America, where we normally do our sourcing from,” he told Guardian Business.

“So there is a backup of supply, causing a shift in supply and demand right now and hopefully when everybody gets back to work in America, we will see a shift and everything will be normalized. They expect it to be normalized before Christmas, so hopefully that’s what happens, but there is a shortage of goods. So if you see something and you need it you should buy it, because before the prices go down they are going to go back up because of supply and demand.”

The US is The Bahamas’ biggest trade partner, with 81.3 percent of total imports, a value of $2.7 billion. It’s challenges with supply chains therefore heavily impact The Bahamas.

Retailers throughout the country, still resurging from the impact of COVID-19 emergency orders on their businesses, have lamented the challenge of maintaining pre-pandemic stocks as commerce returned to the country. Davis said this means that Bahamian consumers have to be more strategic about their shopping, while still supporting local businesses.

“What Bahamian shoppers should do is shop early. It’s unpredictable now, but the basic stuff that you need for back to school, get them as early as possible so that you can also give your supplier some time to see what is going to move. Bahamians have the last-minute syndrome, where we wait until the last minute to buy things. If you wait, the supply may be low and the supplier can’t replenish in time before the schools open,” he said.

“This is similar to what happened last year with desks for homeschooling. Because they took so long to buy it everybody ran out. We’re not just competing with just us here in The Bahamas. It’s a global market, all the other Caribbean islands are affected. Even Florida is affected by what we are affected by in a lot of cases, because a lot of persons buy out of Florida and by the time the containers reach from the West Coast down to Florida, it still has an affect on us.”

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