Survival Food – Freeze Dried & MRE

There are many people who took action to be food prepared at some point in the last five years. And now that it is 2011, they are not.

Are you someone who bought bulk staples and tried to grow a sustenance garden – two, three, even five years ago? Did you watch the food go to waste unused and found you were too busy to keep it up. Now how prepared are you?

If on the other hand you bought a large freeze dried food reserve five years ago, you would still be as prepared in 2011 as when you bought it. And you would continue to be food prepared for another 20 years.

This is the same message I have repeated in many posts. Why keep repeating the message? I keep hearing from readers the same story again and again.

At some point they get enthusiastic about food preparedness. It is driven by fear created in some news story that seems like danger is imminent. They feel a responsibility to protect their family and others from the consequences of some news event of the day. They go around survival sites and get good information and decide that a life dedicated to being prepared is for them.

Then the event does not happen or was smaller than expected and does not affect them.

Remember Y2K, SARs, H1N1, Peak Oil scare 2008, depression and collapse scare of 2009-10?   These events did not directly result in people needing and using a food reserve. However these risks have not gone away.  And every time a risk gets newsworthy again,  you might remember the time and money you previously wasted on food preparedness that withered away a short time later.  What do you feel like doing? Getting prepared again or not? Maybe you just hope the risk goes away and take your chances.

So why not invest in being food  prepared? If this time however, you invest in something that is going to last a long time, there is no reason not to be food prepared.  When you really do need it, it is there for you and your loved ones.

For 2011, my hope none of us need to use our food reserves.

Unfortunately however in 2010,  I do know that some of us who have seen their jobs disappear with no good opportunities on the horizon have already started to use their food reserves. I hope that stops in 2011.

Kevin

Survival food reserves with Mountain House freeze dried food are now back to normal lead times.

A recent spike in demand due to swine flu has subsided.

It had been taking 5-10 days to process orders at some suppliers due to high volumes.

The situation during the swine flu pandemic threat was much better than May 2008.

Then survivalists worried about ‘peak oil’ collapse  caused lead times to go out to 7 to 8 weeks in some cases. Supplies of Mountain House freeze dried food were cut off to just a few online distributors at that time. Rumors circulated at that time suggested there would be as longs as a 20 week lead time on Mountain House freeze dried foods. These rumors turned out to be just rumors as the lead dropped to few days once the oil price dropped last summer.

The price of freeze dried food went up 10% to 15% at this time and has not come down since.

The lead time on freeze dried food increased again in October and November of  2008 as worries of a global economic collapse fueled rabid sales of freeze dried food. Demand remained strong till March but lead times returned to normal. I have observed during this time that when the daily stock market went up sales of freeze dried food go down and vice-versa.  It is probably not a good idea to make long term decisions on preparedness based on day to day news.

With swine flu pandemic threat arising, sales skyrocketed again causing longer lead times but this only lasted a few weeks.

Freeze dried food, which in Mountain House #10 cans can last up to 25 years is a good long term insurance policy against disasters. Threats of disaster come and go but you want to be ready when you need to be. It is best not to wait till there is a threat and lead times get long and prices go up.