I prepped well in advance for the pandemic (a year ago).
I was over-stocked in everything so there were no negative surprises.
My wife was laughing at me until the first time she walked into a grocery store and the paper products aisle was empty.
Then she said—”Well, you blew it on Y2K but you were right on this one...” :-)
We already live way out in the country—so no “people” issues.
When the action started last March, my closest WalMart:
Fresh beef: GONE
Frozen beef: GONE
Fresh (raw) chicken: GONE
Frozen chicken: GONE
Canned Vegetables: GONE
Canned Soups: GONE
Fresh (raw) pork: GONE
bagged Bread: GONE
Toilet paper: GONE
Paper towels: GONE
Hand sanitizer: GONE
While there was shotgun ammo ($20 box) it has been gone for over 2 months now. Maybe 3 months. None at all.
I looked the other day, nearly all the cheese was gone (go figure) and most of the beef was gone (more than half). But there were still a few packages of ground beef and about 25 of the 1-lb ground beef.
Most everything else is back to normal. Except shotgun ammo. Still none.
I thought yours might have been an old post of mine! My wife was VERY thankful that I had prepped.
However - I bought WAY TOO much Hydrogen Peroxide. It was cheap though.
I bought 5 gallons of 100% denatured alcohol. But bought it quickly without learning that 100% didn’t mean 100%(?) - it has methanol in it and is harmful for skin. I also bought a bunch of Aloe to mix it with. Oh well. Now I’m ready to strip the entire house of paint and treat the neighborhood for sunburn.
I bought more of TP, sanitizer, etc. - but not really. I ended up giving a bunch away to relatives and friends. I had a bunch of N95 masks from before and bought maybe 20 new ones. Gave a bunch of those away as well. I wish I had more masks, but still have about 6 unused masks. (We just rotate the ones we have been using).
I keep telling myself that I’m going to learn how to garden one of these days. But I never do it.