MAY RETAILER REPORT

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Hello Everyone!

It's time for the monthly report regarding the good and bad experiences we have had with retailers in the past month.

I have noticed two posts regarding bad experiences recently. Please feel free to name both those retailers who you feel have done you wrong and those who've done you right.

In addition, please point out any sales currently on.

I'll start. Today I purchased the following at Borders:

Yankee Magazine's Make It Last - $4.99

Reader's Digest Household Hints & Handy Tips - $4.99

Alas, Babylon - $1.00

The Essential Guide to Vitamins and Minerals by Elizabeth Somer - $2.99

The Rodale Book of Composting - $1.00

A Year in the Maine Woods by Bernd Heinrich - $2.99

Earl Mindell's Food As Medicine - $2.99

(I think I'm spending too much of my budget on books, but I'm betting that in a crisis knowledge will be a very valuable tool.)

-- GA Russell (garussell@russellga.com), May 03, 1999

Answers

GA Russell,

This is a great idea. Do we have more of these in the Archives with a similar title?

Don't know what will happen about my money or canned food that I ordered from American Heritage Foods. I'm hoping for the best, but Gary Bidlow has provided some very interesting information on the owner and the company. I'll let you know what happens.

With Mother's Day on its way, I ordered some nice little chocolates from www.chocolateofthemonth.com. I have ordered from them before, but they are also a former client.

Several books from www.amazon.com arrived just a few days after doing my one click shopping. I'm reading Mike and Nancy Bubel's "Root Cellaring: Natural Cold Storage of Fruits and Vegetables." I looked over my Aladdin price guide to collector oil lamps by J. Courtney and look forward to becoming an Aladdin Knight. Anyone here a knight?

On Ebay, I bid and had the highest bid on a Geiger Counter. ROFL! Not quite sure how I'm going to explain it when it arrives. I'm expecting it in a week or so. There's quite a few interesting things to bid on at Ebay. Of course, I wish I'd bought Ebay stock when it was offered. Nonetheless, I do not anticipate nuclear threats nor am I preparing for them.

Sincerely, Stan Faryna

-- Stan Faryna (info@giglobal.com), May 03, 1999.


Stan. A geiger counter ( radiation counter) is a usefull thing to have. I am still looking for one preferable one that is calibrated in milli rem. I do not think we will have a nuclear war in my lifetime but I live close to a nuclear power plant and want to have something to warn me. All other needed preperations for a radiation leak are in place.

-- Rickjohn (rickjohn1@yahoo.com), May 03, 1999.

Rickjohn,

A good point. If you live near a nuclear power plant, a geiger counter might come in handy, whether or not you think Y2K is going to be bad. I think I saw some others available on Ebay. Do a key word search if you are looking for one. My girlfriend tells me that her father, a reserve officer, had one and lots of other very interesting equipment. I got the CDV-715, Model 1A Civil Defense radiological survey type geiger counter made by the Victoreen Instrument Company, Cleveland, Ohio. It has a chassis baffled interior IC mounted metal ion chamber rather than an external ion tube and this unit is designed to be overload resistant when exposed to overly abundant and or concentrated emissions of continuous nuclear particulate radiation.

It uses one D cell battery, has a zero adjust, circuit check and Roentgen/hour selections of X100, X10, X1 and X0.1. According the the seller, the unit powers up, zero adjusts, and checks out via the circuit check feature. Supposedly, it is recent military surplus.

Sincerely, Stan Faryna

-- Stan Faryna (info@giglobal.com), May 03, 1999.


Hi Stan!

You will find a similar post named April Retailer Report dated April 1, and a third thread of about March 15.

I'm surprised there is so little response this month. I believe that with this lull in Y2K activity, the merchants are getting supplies in to sell. The waiting period should be less than that of a few months ago.

If that's right, than we will remember this lull fondly. I am surprised that no one has written in to say that his favorite merchant now has the merchandise he hasn't had for a while.

It makes me wonder if the regulars on this forum have reached the point of complete preparedness, or in the alternative are merely political philosophers who really aren't doing anything unusual to prepare.

-- GA Russell (garussell@russellga.com), May 03, 1999.


The Barnes & Noble bookstore in Raleigh had a front table full of y2k prep books this past Sunday. That's the first time I've seen that. In the past, it's just been a stack of Yourdon books alongside a dozen or so stacks of other unrelated books.

-- Puddintame (achillesg@hotmail.com), May 03, 1999.


GA Russell,

My order for my water proof bug out back packs from Cabella's came in yesterday. I haven't taken them out of the plastic shrink wrap yet as I only have United Nations certified wind proof/water proof matches (laughing) to throw in the bottom. It took about four business days to get here from the time I made my online order. Now where is that post that talks about what should go in a bug out bag? Anyone remember it?

A big box from Lehman's also came in (along with the Cabella's box and another with a $20 old lamplighter oil lamp that I had bid on at Ebay). UPS guy , Federal Express guy, and the U.S. Mail man were all standing at my front door at the same time. It felt like Christmas. Anyway, my early February order for the Aladdin three year parts kit arrived, but not the lamp oil. The lamp oil is being drop shipped from the manufacturer. Lehman's took exceptional care in packing the stuff.

My problem with American Harvest Foods continues, but thanks to Gary Bidlow who provided a great deal of information about the supposed owner and the right people to contact, I contacted the State of California Attorney General's office and filed an inquiry (it takes 30 days for them to send a letter to American Harvest Foods requesting a refund of my money). I also contacted the supposed owner's parole officer who seemed like he was interested in helping me find out what went wrong. Pray for me (if you pray) and pray that I get my refund.

I have a feeling, Russell, that some people might not want to disclose how much money they are spending on their preparations. Or give any indication of how much money they are actually spending. It just may fall into that personal and private area of their life or... as a safeguard against Mr. Decker's well-trained scouts who are taking notes and figuring out which fixed positions have the biggest stores. (grin). Then, again, as you mentioned, some people may not really be preparing as they say they are... or its not happening as quickly.

I know that my progress isn't going as well as I would have liked. I wanted to deal with first things first: heat, water, and food, for example. Well, the wood stove is something that I want to save up for, the 55 water drums for just a month is also something to save up for, and the food... (laughing) well, that's mostly screwed up except for what I got at Costco. So here I am wanting just to get one month of basic preps down), and I haven't done a good job in making it happen.

It would have been a lot easier if I started in the fall of 1998 as opposed to GIing around February 1999. The basic prepping might have fallen into place better-- if I didn't think I had some luxury of time. Here's the problem! If I knew things were going to unglue in a week, I'd be acting very differently. And I imagine that we are going to have to make newbies face up to this... sometime in the fall or so. Maybe, I need to face up to it now. (smile) But I'm hoping that I still have a three or four month window to get together everything I want including a certain and comforting redundancy in basic things.

If Y2K was next week, I wouldn't be waiting to get money together for a good-looking, air tight wood stove or the 55 gallon water drums. I'd stick exclusively to store bought canned food, get a petromax lantern for light/ heat, camping water filter, camping stove, survival/garden books, seeds, fuel, wool blankets, and get some trash cans and liners for the water. This stuff wouldn't fit in so neatly with the decor, but it would do. Of course, there wouldn't be any redundancy in my preps either... or money for things like a geiger counter or whatever.

Sincerely, Stan Faryna

-- Stan Faryna (info@giglobal.com), May 04, 1999.


P.S. Two more thoughts.

It'd be a great idea to include a clickable link to past reports in every new monthly retailer report. Maybe, someone who is proficient at this can volunteer a few minutes to putting the links in a response.

Why do I think that I have a three or four month window? My assumption is that most people will find the big ticket items like wood stoves and gallon drums to be too expensive to get at the get go. I also assume that most people are going to have to budget for things just as I am... and bide some time while they get the money together. And I'm assuming that the supply line is not going to have problems for a few more months (at least in part due to the effective media campaigns). It is an awful lot of assumptions to make and I hope I won't be sorry.

-- Stan Faryna (info@giglobal.com), May 04, 1999.


Rickjohn,

I was thinking how I am not near a nuclear power plant and how glad I was about this. Then, my girlfriend reminded me that less than 5 miles away is a disease and chemical research facility that once had caused some worries about Ebola. (laughing) There is just no way of feeling insulated from the threats of the modern world. My girlfriend grew up in Kansas and she describes her childhood as perfectly safe and friendly, depsite the fact that the big silos were in the backyard.

Sincerely, Stan Faryna

-- Stan Faryna (info@giglobal.com), May 04, 1999.


Hi Stan!

I think it was Greybear who said that he did not expect to ever be completely prepared. Instead, he would continue to make preparations, and his efforts would never end.

That's the way I look at it.

By the way, today at Save A Lot I found 69 cent 3-liter bottles of soft drinks, $1.79 cans of Spam, 39 cent boxes of baking soda, and 3/$1.00 butane lighters.

-- GA Russell (garussell@russellga.com), May 04, 1999.


Update on the American Harvest Foods (AHF) situation. I received an email describing a highly positive experience with AHF but also an unsatisfactory experience with someone else. I'm not saying who as I could suddenly discover I am an unwitting pawn of competitive firms. The email said that the AHF phones were being answered, so I picked up the phone and gave them a ring. Someone answered the phone! Hurrah! Someone's name was Nancy. After a long and, ultimately, a pleasant conversation, we can only wait and see what will or will not happen.

Sincerely, Stan Faryna

-- Stan Faryna (info@giglobal.com), May 04, 1999.



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