Why is everyone so obsessed with toilet paper?
Category: Health, Science & Technology
Via: buzz-of-the-orient • 4 years ago • 70 commentsBy: CHRISTIAN COTRONEO
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Why is everyone so obsessed with toilet paper?
Like this Costco shopper in San Francisco, consumers feel the need to buy more toilet paper. (Photo: Kevin McGovern/Shutterstock.com)
If we could sum up the viral times in which we're living in just a few words, they might be: "Just two per customer."
Everyone gets anxious when the world takes an uncertain turn. And often, we treat that anxiety with a little panic buying .
A study published last year in the Journal of Consumer Research found that people buy things in troubled times as a means of exerting control over their lives. And it's not necessarily new clothes or gadgets. The researchers noted that utility items — specifically, cleaning products — tend to move most briskly from store shelves.
The hoarding of toilet paper, as perhaps the most fundamental cleaning product, may represent our most fundamental fears. An invisible enemy stalks us. It's shutting down countries like dominoes, forcing people to stay home, disconnected from public life as increasingly bad news about coronavirus rolls in.
Maybe people are squeezing the Charmin because, in uncertain times, we need to hold on to something. Maybe a stockpile of toilet paper brings assurances.
There's plenty of love in a time of coronavirus too. Retailers in Australia are giving seniors and people with disabilities their own time to shop. Chinese billionaire Jack Ma is sending America a gift of 1 million masks and 500,000 testing kits.
But mostly, there's fear. And it's nowhere more evident than in the toilet paper aisle.
The truth about toilet paper
The thing is, it's not actually going anywhere. For all the sharp words and even sharper elbows thrown around by toilet paper marauders, they seem to be missing one essential fact: There is no toilet paper shortage.
As The New York Times points out , retailers that see their shelves emptied often restock them in a day, often in just a few hours. Toilet paper makers are rolling with demand, but they're careful not to ratchet up production too dramatically.
That's because people with respiratory illnesses don't actually need more toilet paper.
So why should manufacturers dramatically ramp up production? Cupboards get filled. The market gets glutted. And then, prices go down.
"You are not using more of it. You are just filling up your closet with it," Jeff Anderson, president of paper product manufacturer Precision Paper Converters, tells the Times. "What happens in the summer when demand dries up and people have all this extra product in their homes?"
Probably the same thing that will happen to hand sanitizers and cleansing wipes — people will buy less. If any of these industries decides to cash in on all that panic buying now, it only hurts them down the road. Slow and steady seems to be the refrain from manufacturers in both the U.S. and Canada.
"We've got all the raw material, we've got all the assets running, we have all the production, our sites are at full capacity to recover from this spike," Dino Bianco, chief executive officer of Kruger Products LP, tells the Globe & Mail .
Manufacturers are rolling with the demand, but they're not drastically increasing production. (Photo: Studio Dagdagaz/Shutterstock)
The thing is, the toilet paper-addled masses have been infected with something many times more contagious than any coronavirus: fear.
"People, being social creatures, we look to each other for cues for what is safe and what is dangerous," Steven Taylor, a clinical psychologist at the University of British Columbia, tells Fox News . "And when you see someone in the store panic-buying, that can cause a fear-contagion effect."
"People become anxious ahead of the actual infection," he adds. "They haven't thought about the bigger picture, like what are the consequences of stockpiling toilet paper."
Or, of course, their dignity circling the drain.
And what about the run on paper towels? There's no data suggesting infected people tend to spill their drinks more often. Ahh . . . wait a minute. We know what you're planning to do with that stuff. Just know this: Paper towels do not go down easy on plumbing.
Unlike their toilet-friendly counterparts, paper towels and napkins aren't designed to break down when they come into contact with water. Just the opposite, actually. They keep it together, so they can soak up as much of a spill as possible. But that very sturdiness is what keeps them from circling the drain, eventually clogging pipes — and creating a very different kind of tempest in a toilet bowl.
If you really need the comfort of a well-stocked bathroom cupboard, but don't want to join the barbarians at the gates of Costco, there's another option: Make your own toilet paper.
It's a surprisingly simple process. It starts with a few sheets of newspaper — which, these days, may not be easy to come by. But yesterday's news, in addition to being a wonderful substitute for toilet paper, may also remind us of a powerful truth in even the darkest of times: All things must pass.
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I had posted elsewhere that it's too bad it isn't the fall - there'd be LOTS of product available to wipe your ass.
I have a corn field next to me that hasn't been plowed down yet. It will be plowed down by next week, so does anyone want me to ship some cobs out before it's plowed down?
Only the Shadow knows.
I don't get the panic buying thought process either but I guess some people just get swept up in the moment. No probs here I've got 8 rolls so figure I'm good for at least a couple months
Don't know, I bought a 20 pack weeks ago, will last me a while.
Such people like the man in image above is an "early innovator shopper." Not particularly stressed by cost, always working to keep ahead of the curve and with the trend, and maybe, just maybe, worries about being left out of the loop.
Most of us are "mainstream shoppers." Basically, we look over the cost. Take our time and get just what is reasonably usable over a respectable time.
Meet thy sister: "Little panic stealing." Somebody knows where we all live and where we 'park' the good stuff.
Thank God my Mother taught me to stock up. I didn't need to run out and buy toilet paper because I already had a six month supply but I was surprised to see the shelves completely empty at the store. I went shopping this morning and they were out of Milk which confused me since Milk goes bad why would people buy more than usual, sometimes panic buying gets the better of people and I think they're going to be wasting a lot of Milk or eating a lot of Cereal.
You can draw off a cup and put the rest of the gallon into the deep freeze indefinitely.
Does it taste the same when thawed?
Tastes the same to me.
Since I only restock my place every two months I've been buying 15 gallons of milk at a time for years now.
If you've got the freezer space milk, (and bread), do fine going from frozen to thawed.
As Bccrane notes, don't forget to pour off enough so that your plastic jug doesn't split as the freezing milk expands.
My refrigerator thaws a gallon of milk out in about 24 hours.
For me, move a frozen gallon from freezer to fridge Monday morning, pour a cup for dinner Tuesday evening.
Others might need more thawing time.
Thawed bread gets a little crusty a bit quicker than a loaf bought fresh but it still taste fine.
...................
Hope they get the supply chain problems resolved soon, I'm due for a supply run in early April.
A week ago my online shopping cart with Walmart had 104 items already picked out for my next run but as I call up the site today there are only 49 items still in the cart, all my other items are showing "Out of Stock".
Dam it, I sure hope I don't have to drop down from Bi-Monthly to Bi-Weekly runs to town!
Hey you! As I live and breathe, you REALLY are what you call yourself?!! (STELLAR SMILE.)
Yes'em, full hermit since 2007.
You know what they say; "It's Not a Job, It's a Calling" (smile)
Thanks for the info, who knows it may come in handy one day. Though for now I'm a townie and just do minimal weekly shopping
If you can't buy fresh milk, they might have powdered.
I've already got some Sunshine. It's not bad but a bit of hassle to make and best served VERY cold to improve the taste.
I can do fine without the milk it's the other items that have gone out of stock I'll have to work around. Dried beans, rice, chicken, beef, ham, paper goods, peanut butter, mayo, some can and frozen goods have ALL dropped out of my shopping cart.
I guess, looking at what I still have in the cart, I can get a week or two of meals using the bread & hamburger buns, (hamburger patties - out), sprinkle them with dry roasted salted peanuts, (peanut butter - out), maybe add some jalapeno slices, put a spicy dill pickle and some corn chips on the side, (20 bags of assorted chips still showing in the shopping cart), and wash it all down with fresh tap water. (smile)
Hope it doesn't come down to having to cobble my meals together out of whatever random, weird, odds and end things they just happen to have available on the day I drive down to town.
My mother used to buy it sometimes and force me and brother to drink it.
So you were abused as a child. That's sad.........../s
Yep, had to make my bed too!
How is it in coffee, I can do without my cereal but not my coffee and I can't stand coffee creamer. I could just buy evaporated milk for coffee since I know I like that because I use it when camping.
BIGGEST SMILE EVER.
Not sure Zuksam, I drink my coffee black and thick as motor oil.
Perhaps the powdered milk would be milder than powdered creamer but I just can't say from my own experience.
Not in my opinion. It's not terrible, but not the same as if it hasn't been frozen.
They are the French Toasters. Happens every snowstorm to the milk, eggs and bread.
It cures coronavirus, doesnt it?
Maybe they're using it as replaceable filters for homemade face masks.
Funny you bring up the "good old days of " I met the most amazing old man today who enlightened me to something I have seen in books, but don't really cotton to: the bidet. I so strongly wanted to say,
"What you talking about, Old man?!" Man older than me.
to him. We're standing next to open boxes of beans sitting on the floor—the shelves are empty. I turn, he asks me, if I know where the toilet paper is kept. I tell him on the far wall and Whamo! I run head long into a discussion about his nether-regions being refreshed by his in-home bidet. And this nugget: He just goes - "bidet" and pulls his pants up and goes about his day.
I got the videos. Blah! Yep. That happened. Now to the left-over question: If he just bidets (pronounce chic), why is he asking for toilet paper in a store? I will never know.
Now, how many of us have heard or seen 'misadventures' across the countr—the world and would like to share them since this life and death drama begin?
Well, because a bidet resembles a small fountain he might still use toilet paper to dry himself.
A wise friend here told me it’s because no one wants to die with a dirty ass.
Swamp-ass bad!
I've always heard it ends up dirty anyway.
Time to: Shelter in Place.
My wife is from the Philippines and every single household there and here have what they call a tabo. It is just a small pitcher or any container you can fill with water, preferably warm, to wash your ass with.
No paper needed.
"Why is everyone so obsessed with toilet paper?"
That one I haven't figured out.
Saw a Great "Meme" the other day on this !
LMAO
It's really gotten that "INSANE" out there !
LOL, all you youngsters and city dwellers.
Back in the day we only had an outhouse. Toilet paper was a sears catalog or in the spring a new green maple leaf. (sorry Buzz)
I have a maple tree in the back yard so I'm good to go...LOL
Of course Red isn't all that excited about my solution. She grew up in Brooklyn and thought that Central Park was the Amazon rain forest.
You know there is nothing more sexy than newsprint on your butt.
It's better than the alternative. LOL
But, the pics you can get - wow.
Green Acres, the television series comes to mind. Goodness me, I can remember those days when I used to get driven out to the country and those farm outhouses.
My cousin went camping once but did not know an oak leaf from poison oak. You can guess what happened.
He never went camping again?
Fully developed world sanitary plumbing is very under appreciated until such time one experiences the old TP in the waste basket experience
That too lol.
LOL!
And now for a completely different obsession regarding TP. Well no so much an obsession as a bitch.
What does any commercial operation think it’s saving with that half ply flypaper crap you see all the time in commercial settings? Everyone just bunches it up to normal two or three ply thickness anyway.
Hell you have to if you don’t like getting shit all over your hand.
Its stoopid!
LOL, my guess is budget optics
There are alternatives for toilet paper as Exodus and Slayer guitarist Gary Holt points out on Instagram .
Imodium?