Crunch Time: Will you help me on my book?
I am spending the next few days in seclusion to finish my book coming out this fall from Regnery! The topic? Well, I bet you can guess.
I would love your help on this! I’ll post and email here some of the holes I am trying to fill and I would love to get your feedback on specific parts.
Today’s subject: Comment below and tell me about your area of expertise - your industry and how the lockdowns impacted you!
Here’s an excerpt to give you a taste of the style of the book::
The first signs that something was amiss surfaced in March 2020 when a run on toilet paper began in the days leading up the federal 2-week shutdown. My wife and I sped to Costco to get one of their infamous 30-roll Kirkland slabs to haul home. When we got there the line had already formed snakelike around the building and through the parking lot. Like anything at Costco — it was fairly organized and linear - sending us on a direct path to the back room, guided by a dozens of workers through the building with a constant reminder only to take 1 package. That was the beginning of the supply chain problems that persist even at the writing of this book.
The paucity of TP in those coming weeks became a running joke but the empty aisles spread like its own virus to other sections of the store: yogurt, ramen, flour, sugar, all with rotating signs limiting customers to one purchased item. This wasn’t just about demand — in many ways it was about shifting demands.
Take the TP (while you can!). After talking to a few people in the know I figured out the obvious: people do half of their “business” at their businesses. The distribution of toilet paper for commercial developments involves industrial production of the paper we’ve come to love. Not necessarily your soothing bear-mascot quality but rather efficient large quantities packages into large reams which janitorial staff then mount in stalls in massive dispensers or efficient gizmos holding multiple rolls. This happens every day in hotels, airports, theme parks, skyscrapers, stadiums, schools, dorms… you name.
When you stop the engine which tended to our nether regions the impacts are enough for anyone to reach for the Pepto Bismal.
Imagine this: you’re an executive down at the fictitious TP supplier “Wipe World.” The call comes in for the shutdown and you have some serious decisions to make. Production managers at the Big Roll Mill (your supplier for industrial reems of TP) have shut down and will eventually furlough most of the staff. Your shipping contracts will go into default, trucks with slabs of TP rolls tightly wrapped and ready to dispensed will be called back or mothballed for a bit. The proverbial target of your product is about to hit the fan.
On the plus side it turns out that profits on the consumer side of Wipe World are going to be just fine as demand outstrips supply. You stand to make a good profit if you can shift manufacturing to meet the new demand.
The marketing team is way ahead of you and pitching a product called “Wipe Forever” which comes with a freestanding mount promising you an entire month supply of TP in one massive roll. Essentially, you repackage the industrial into a consumer-friendly. Problems solved! (Google “Charmin Forever” if you think I’m kidding).
SO! What happened in YOUR particular industry? Did the lockdowns shift, morph or even destroy your way of life? I’d love some more examples to include!
Thanks
Justin
I work for a hospice and develop instructional materials. We had to create materials to teach families how to use FaceTime, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, etc so they could say goodbye to their dying loved one because they were not allowed in facilities. Those families will never recover from that trauma.
2020 began with great optimism - 2019 my business partner and myself (education technology industry) had built banner years for us both & for the company and decided in 2019 to join forces to make a more prosperous future for our families after 8 years of lean and sacrifice; we thought we were poised for another awesome year. We got the call first from one of my daughters' school talking about an extended spring break (14 days to "flatten" a curve), then our formerly great governor (TX) declared some of us nonessential (2 years later we still are under "emergency powers", my wife in Costco (not for the run on TP) is scared to death by a person in a gas mask...that's right a gas mask and calls me freaking out, then the city parks decide the virus is like nuclear fallout and put up caution tape around all the playgrounds, in addition they placed 2x4s on the basketball rims (b/c the science was clear??), my other daughter with Down Syndrome lost access to months of needed therapies and friends, my business development went from optimism to not hearing from CUSTOMERS for 6 - 10 months, much less potential new clients; all new sales dried up, & in order to escape the madness of TX we fled to FL for the month of April and it dawned on me even further, this is an absolute, abject failure of public responsibility for our elected and unelected officials. In FL where we were, we spoke to a sheriff in Walton County and his quote still resonates today - "as a sheriff we will not trample the constitution b/c of a virus". Fast forward to 12/31/20 I achieved a 55% drop in my income only to recover to a mere 52% drop in 2021 (from the 2019 level) - two PPP loans later amounted to 3 months of help. Two years in a row and staring a third down now, my income in my primary industry was destroyed and may never recover. In the summer of 2020 I picked up a second job which was a God-send but that doesn't make it right from a public policy perspective. I had the grace from God to find a second job which has been income producing to a degree, I don't think that's the norm. Outside of airplanes and the 10 foot walk to my desk at my work space, I have refused and forbid my family from wearing masks unless someone specifically asked them to do so respectively and with reason. My wife almost caved to the shot after months of propaganda but after what became a 3rd job of educating myself and my surroundings as to the reality of covid and the response to it making it all worse, it produced too much unneeded anxiety in our lives. So my family by God's grace came through wonderfully, not b/c of government but inspite of it. But my business and ability to earn an income was punished from day 1 to now day 730 and counting. I'm thankful for the new friends for sure, you Mr. Hart, Dr. Cabrera in FL, Clay Travis, Alex, to name a few. But it doesn't justify the excessive destruction that I and we all warned about which would come from the lock downs et al and we will not adequately understand the totality of it for years and/or decades unfortunately. FIGHT ON! This speaks to none of the educational loss we will all have to deal with, we in TX are already lowering "learning standards" b/c of the nonsensical "mitigation efforts" of our public officials.