Kerosene, coffee and sugar was acquired by my grandparents by trading eggs for them with the mobile peddler who came around once a week. If things go south, a good “business” for city folks would be a peddler who goes out into the farmland and brings the bartered produce back to town and peddles it to suppliers of other goods to take back out to the farmland. The peddler has the option of taking eggs for coffee and sell the eggs for more than the coffee cost him, or he can trade the eggs with a grocer for coffee. There are all sorts of ways to get what you need if you have common sense and good ideas. BTW. I loved the peddler. We would watch for him on his “days” and would run down the lane to meet him while grandmother gathered her bartering products. He would always throw in a peppermint stick for each one of us into the bargain. I used to think that I would love to be that peddler who got to drive a big truck stocked with shelves full of staples like cofee, tea, sugar, baking power/soda, salt, pepper, spices, and candy for all the children. I never felt poor, but blessed with so much bounty when I spent summers at grandparents farm. At home, things were not so good. We lived on my father’s teacher salary of $300 a year (yes, a year).
The peddler would always be running from an IRS ghoul these days.