Welcome back to the Office Groceries blog! We hope that in the midst of what is turning out to be, in more than one way, a truly viral news topic, Coronavirus isn’t getting you too down. In a departure from our more light-hearted post from last week, Crazy Uses for the Fruit in your Fruit Basket Deliveries, we are delving into some news-related content. While the coronavirus is spreading, the buying up of certain goods is sky-rocketing. The question we’re sure is on all of your lips, is whether or not this virus will affect your morning milk delivery.
In this blog post we will give you some of the stats and facts surrounding the coronavirus outbreak. Will it affect your morning milk delivery? You’re about to find out.
1. They’re outta oat milk!
As reported by Business Insider, there has been a steep increase in the amount of oat milk being sold in Europe and the US. The online publication worked out that a whopping 441% sales increase has been seen for the favoured dairy alternative. This is an unprecedented amount – imagine how many iced oat milk lattes that would take care of! Not even the most basic of all the Instagram girls could consume that much. But does that mean a shortage in your morning milk delivery?
Not from us here at Office Groceries, thankfully. You can count on us to keep your oat milk flowing throughout this crisis, as our stockists will not run out in the same way it would in a supermarket. Not to mention the fact that all the oat milk you already have will last a while. Oat milk is generally shelf-stable, unlike dairy milk which must be refrigerated. So rest assured, your morning oat milk coffee is secure – for a while at least.
2. Look at all those almonds!
Another milk that seems to be affected by the dreaded coronavirus is almond milk. A firm favourite in many a morning milk delivery, an almond milk shortage would cause many an office worker some significant upset should it run out. So is this a possibility? Well, according to Market Watch, there may actually be a surplus. The most recent almond harvest yielded a record amount of these little brown gems and this has coincided with a lack of demand from China. Due to the spread of the virus, there are fewer ports open to receive goods and fewer workers to handle them. Consequently, the country that was once the second largest consumer of US almonds is no longer able to play ball. The US has been left with a lot of almonds and not a lot to do with them.
California already produces 80% of the world’s almonds. So, now that the US is teeming with even more almonds, there may be a decrease in their pricing in the coming months. So if anything, it will far easier for companies to get their hands on the almonds they need to make the precious fluid for your morning milk delivery. Our range of oat milk is still there to be browsed, fear not.
3. Should your office stock up?
Many people have begun stockpiling certain items to keep in their homes. While this may seem extreme, for some people the shortage of food seems like a frightening and very real prospect. As the Guardian reported, people are worried that they are going to be confined to their homes. A man from Salisbury named Efrim Nicholas has been stockpiling, as he says, “We just wanted to have a safety net because we don’t have masses of confidence in the government response.”
It is worth bearing in mind, however, that if you are bound to anywhere in a state of emergency, it will be your home, not the office. So stockpiling your oat and almond milks in the office may be a slightly dramatic. For now, just enjoy your office milk delivery and try not to panic. Keep calm and carry on, as it were.
We hope that you enjoyed this post! Coronavirus is scary but is not the end of the world, least of all for your milk. If the world is about to end, remember, there’s always good old UHT.