How Did Toilet Paper Break the Supply Chain

you know

just a year ago i never would have

believed

that this would become one of the most

sought after items in the nation

when the coronavirus pandemic hit panic

buying sent

everyone rushing to the store to grab

whatever was left on the shelf

only for us to realize that well maybe i

didn’t need

15 bottles of hand sanitizer or 400

rolls of toilet paper

but the problem was more serious than

bath tissue and disinfectants

the new york times ran the following

headline

but wait weren’t all the grocery stores

running low on these very products

something serious was happening in the

world

business insider wrote about bill bian a

potato farmer from sheridan montana

who threw away over 700 tons of potatoes

on his farm alone

bill had so many potatoes he needed a

bulldozer to get them all into the hole

where he buried his crops for the year

but as the new york times and many other

news outlets reported

we saw the same thing happening with

milk eggs and livestock

the united states government even hired

federal veterinarians to help the

process of

depopulating millions of pigs chicken

and cows so i gave mr buying a call to

figure out

what was happening he explained that as

soon as the schools and restaurants shut

down

the processing plants that farmers like

mr bain relied on

had to cut down on their own production

which in turn meant

they needed less from the farmers see

the problem was not that no one wanted

milk or eggs or beef

in fact these items were becoming harder

and harder to find at supermarkets and

stores

it’s the supply chain from the growers

to the supermarket that was disrupted

what happens in the standard supply

chain in america

is that one category is reliant on the

next to buy their products

a potato farmer like bill sells to a

distribution company

who then ships the products over to a

manufacturing plant

where the potatoes are made into french

fries or mashed potatoes

and these processed foods are then sold

to another distributor

who then ships the products over to end

buyers like schools

restaurants and supermarkets like

walmart

but the problem we faced back in spring

was caused by a single piece of this

system

being removed from the equation the

consumers of the product

schools restaurants and businesses were

not buying

since the product was not being consumed

distributors had no one to ship their

products to

manufacturers had no one to distribute

for them

and in the case of food farmers had no

one to process their crops

so while all this was happening

americans were losing their jobs and

couldn’t afford to feed their families

businesses shut down

and upwards of 57 million americans

were left without a salary so

many turn to food banks but soon enough

the food banks themselves run out of

food

how could it be that farmers were

throwing away tons of crops

and slaughtering millions of animals

while food banks were unable to feed

hungry americans

it was evident that we were dealing with

a supply chain issue

where farmers sold only to their

distributors and not to end buyers like

restaurants and schools

so i asked mr bayan what is stopping you

from selling your potatoes directly to

the food banks

his response where would i find enough

food banks to sell all my potatoes to

and he raised a valid point a local food

bank in sheridan montana

couldn’t possibly handle all 700 tons of

his potatoes

now while mr bayan did donate well over

one ton of potatoes to soup kitchens and

food banks

he just could not find enough people to

sell all his potatoes to

so we threw them away that right there

is the essence of the problem

but remember it’s not just about animals

and crops

on the personal protective equipment

front we needed a way to

defend ourselves from the virus

at the start of the pandemic many

brewing companies that typically make

alcoholic beverages

shifted their production to making hand

sanitizer because of the alcohol content

and disinfectants

heretic brewing company made that change

in spring 2020

but many small businesses like this one

were faced with a similar problem

let’s say a brewing company in a small

town in nebraska

produces hundreds of bottles of hand

sanitizer and decides to either donate

or sell these bottles

the brewing company produces more than

what their local town needs

now while this small town in nebraska

may have experienced

the luxury of having too much hand

sanitizer to go around

larger cities across the nation were

faced with harsh shortages

because their usual suppliers ran out of

the product

let’s take the example of a hospital in

san francisco that needs sanitizer

they look to their distributor who has

no supplier to fulfill that hospital’s

request

in nebraska there was no buyer in san

francisco there was no supplier

the issue was getting the hand sanitizer

from from the brewing company in

nebraska

to the hospital in san francisco

america needed a way for a supplier with

an

excess of valuable items to be able to

post their products on a public platform

so that buyers can get in direct contact

with them

so i had an idea for a website that

would target this very problem

i called it supply chain relief it was a

win-win for both the buyer and the

supplier

now when you type in supply chain

relief.org into your web browser

you’ll be taken to this forum here

buyers can either browse and scroll the

site

or they can hit supplies at the top of

the menu bar

where they can actually search for a

particular item

once they find the item they’re looking

for they will hit the box that says

contact information and just like that

they will have the email address and or

phone number

of the company that supplies that

product

it really is just that simple

i thought of this idea back in april

2020

but by november we had grown weary of

pandemic restrictions

in california businesses reopened

restaurants started offering outdoor

dining

movie theaters were back in operation

and in other parts of the country

restrictions were even more lacks the

hospitalizations continued to rise

we saw more than 200 000 new cases per

day

and even worse we reported a shocking 3

000 deaths per day

but this was not the only scary part

what made all of this worse

was that we still did not have a way to

get masks on the faces of doctors

nurses or even the general public

doctors and hospitals who risk their

lives for us

every day are being given a limited

number of masks

a nurse reported in november that she

still uses the same

five n95 masks that she was given back

in march

but this was not a problem in south

korea it was not a problem in new

zealand

it was a problem in the united states

the superpower country of the world

as i was programming supply chain relief

with covet in mind

i thought that perhaps a similar

solution could be used for the wildfires

that were

raging all over california now while the

state never entirely ran out of

firefighting equipment

continued natural disasters like

wildfires and earthquakes

could potentially disrupt the supply

chain

and then i thought what will america’s

system look like in a world of future

pandemics

or biochemical warfare hospitals will be

overcrowded with patients and once again

personal protective equipment will be at

a shortage

similarly some parts of the country and

even the world

will be better off when it comes to how

much product they will have stocked

the pandemic has highlighted this issue

but the ramifications of it

are not unique to kovit we are not

dealing with a coveted problem

we are dealing with a supply chain

problem

adding some kind of a bridge between

buyer and supplier

such as supply chain relief solves the

problem that we faced

bypasses the bottleneck we faced back in

spring 2020.

a potato farmer like bill not only can

avoid throwing away

700 tons of potatoes but can actually

sell them to buyers across the world

so while kovit still endangers the lives

of many fear not

now the hospitals and stores can get the

food the personal protective equipment

and yes the toilet paper that they need

we will no longer have to worry about

whether there will be enough to go

around

thank you