As we have seen in class and as @CMERIZALDE has mentioned in the previous post, inventory control is really important for a company and there are different ways of controlling it. Nevertheless, when society is suffering from panic, like coronavirus they begin to do panic sales and the normal supply grocery stores are receiving is not enough, the company will experience shortages. In a lot of countries, shelves are getting empty. In my case, I have seen photos of supermarkets in Spain, Mexico, the US, Ecuador, Dominican Republic and Peru, empty, without toilet paper, water, tuna, rice, and other nonperishable goods, the panic sales don´t give time to supermarkets to replenish the shelves and their logistics system are oversaturated.
As another option, people are using technology to avoid doing physical contact and are trying to buy online groceries. Mercadona, Carrefour and Corte Inglés, among others have experienced an increase of 138% in the week of February 24 and March 1, due to the overdemand, they have been hiring temporary workers to try to satisfy it, but in some cases like in Madrid, Mercadona cancel the sales because they were not able to warranty the deliveries. In other cases, Dia and Carrefour are limiting their services to “the one that most needed” like people over 60 years old.
Additionally to groceries, other sectors have experienced an increase in demand, clothes stores like Mango and Zara had an increase in their online sales, one of the reasons is because their physical stores are closed due to quarantine. Similarly, technology stores have experienced an increase in their online shopping, the most popular products are video games, computers, tablets and TVs. It´s important to mentioned that delivery guys are one of the people that will be more at risk due to their exposure.
Here are more news if you are interested in the subjetc.
https://smoda.elpais.com/moda/actualidad/compras-online-coronavirus/
https://www.modaes.es/entorno/coronavirus-y-si-ni-el-ecommerce-salva-a-la-moda.html
The blog of Logistics at MGEPS at UPV 