The Return of Empty Shelves and Panic Buying

Walk around a supermarket in the U.S. or Europe and you will see some empty shelves once more. This isn’t due to people panic-buying toilet paper, as they did early on in the pandemic; rather it’s because supply chains are clogged at almost every stage between Asian factories and grocery stock rooms.

But rising prices and patchy availability mean it’s only a matter of time before shoppers start purchasing in bulk again — this time to avoid future sticker shock.