Freeze Dried & MRE - Survival Food

I have seen reports on various sites that say that Mountain House will not be selling #10 cans on their website until the end of 2009.

This statement is correct.

I called Mountain House customer service and they confirmed this is the case. An updated notice should appear on their website soon.

However it was also being said that dealers only had limited supply of Mountain House #10 cans and after that dealers could be out of stock for as long as 20 weeks!

The above statement is not correct!

Mountain House customer service confirmed that they would continue to supply their TOP DEALERS.

The supply is limited and on allocation to these dealers due to high demand.

I called Nitro-Pak customer service and they confirmed that they will continue to take orders and shipping lead times are at present 2-4 weeks and will continue into the foreseeable future. This applies to #10 cans sold by themselves and special food reserve packages.

However since the supply of #10 cans from Mountain House is on limited allocation to dealers, if demand increases even more, the lead times will only get longer.

However you will still get freeze dried food in #10 cans if and when you order from their dealers, the question is just on how long it will take to get delivery.

Latest from Nitro-pak on #10 cans of freeze dried food;

**PRICES GOING UP August 1, 2008: Mountain House has announced that prices will be going up on August 1, 2008. In order for our customers to “lock-in” todays lower food prices, we will honor the current lower prices on all orders received before this date. ORDER NOW!

I noticed a further update on Nitro-pak’s website;

IMPORTANT SHIPPING NOTE: Do to current market conditions, huge customer demand, worldwide food shortages and tight supplier allocations (most of our competitors have been totally cut off by the factory), orders will ship in approximately 3 to 4 Weeks from receipt and will be shipped in the order we receive them. We are receiving limited stock weekly. Don’t delay ordering. The longer you wait, the longer the line is getting. Sorry. Just being up front & honest.
Your charge card WILL NOT be charged until 3-5 days prior to shipping.
Thanks you for your patience!

This does not contain any new information other than “competitors being cut off” whatever that means, and I am checking what the status at other online retailers.

Mountain House website is still saying they are not directly selling #10 cans of freeze dried food, the statement there says;

We regret to inform you Oregon Freeze Dry cannot satisfy all Mountain House #10 can orders and we have removed #10 cans from our website temporarily. The reason for this is sales of #10 cans have continued to increase. OFD is allocating as much production capacity as possible to this market segment…..We expect this situation to be necessary for several months although this isn’t a guarantee. We will update this information as soon as we know more. We apologize for this inconvenience and appreciate your patience. We sincerely hope you will continue to be Mountain House customers in the future.

I think the panic buying we have been seeing by survivalist driven consumers, caused by worry about the manifestation of “peak oil theory”, will ease off if the price of oil goes down $15 to $20 or so soon. However it will be some time before the availability of freeze dried food will improve and prices will go down. If the price of oil goes up much more, then the demand for freeze dried food will likely spike exponentially higher unfortunately.

Just read on Nitro-Pak’s website that Mountain House freeze dried food prices will be going up July 1st. This is the statement on Nitro-Pak’s site;

**PRICES GOING UP JULY 1, 2008:Mountain House has announced that prices will be going up on JULY 1, 2008. In order for our customers to “lock-in” todays lower food prices, we will honor the current lower prices on all orders received before this date. ORDER NOW!”

The food shortages reported in the news have resulted in increased lead times and now the food price increases are starting to be seen on survival food’s such as Mountain House #10 cans of freeze dried food and pouches. There is no indication how much the prices will increase. As the note says orders placed now will honor the current prices. Since prices tend to go up fast but back down slowly I expect the higher prices on freeze dried food to last for some time unfortunately. Single mountain house #10 cans are orderable again on Nitro-pak’s site but based on this news I think most will be stocking up on bigger food reserve packages before the prices increase.

As mentioned in a previous post, Mountain House #10 cans are still available at Nitro-Pak and other online retailers but the lead times have increased to 3-7 weeks.

Today I noticed that the Mountain House #10 can individual entrees and 6 can cases had disappeared from Nitro-Pak’s website.

The mountain house freeze dried food reserves, year’s supply, variety packs, and group food reserve units were still there and on sale but with aforementioned 3-7 week lead times.

I called Nitro-pak and spoke with Lisa in customer service. I confirmed that they were still shipping food reserve packages listed above but they have temporarily stopped selling the individual #10 can entrees and cases to devote all allocated supply to their food reserve packages and 6 can cases.

Lisa said they hoped to resume those sales by June 15th. So there is no need to panic.

You can still buy Mountain House food reserves packages now at the 3-7 week lead time.