Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Asda today set a limit of three for any item and two for essential products, such as toilet roll and handwash.
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Morrisons and other retailers are set to follow suit in the coming days.
Pleas for shoppers to stop panic buying have not worked – coupled with issues getting some products from abroad.
Stores have been forced to act after empty shelves for loo rolls, pasta and hand wash have extended to fresh produce, bread, meat plus lower levels of cereals.
Rationing was introduced in 1940 by the government, a year after the start of WW2. It was slowly lifted after the end of the war in 1945 but didn’t finally end until 1954.
Morrisons is hiring 3,500 more staff while Sainsbury’s and Asda are shutting cafes and fresh counters.
Amazon has stopped accepting non essential items at its delivery warehouse, meaning some items may go out of stock or take longer to get delivered.
Supermarkets have also introduced “silver” shopping hours for elderly customers so that they can get supplies.
Online grocery firm Ocado has removed its app and its website has a two-hour waiting time as delivery slots for supermarkets sell out.
Tesco and Asda has announced their 24-hour stores will close early to help them re-stock overnight.
Supermarkets impose limits on stock
Tesco, Asda and Sainsbury’s are limiting stock to three of each item per person.
Last week Aldi introduced a strict limit of four per item.
Below the table explains how supermarkets are rationing items.
It is expected that other supermarkets will introduce limits across all of their stock within the coming days
Online delivery slots sell out
Online grocer Ocado has removed its app and its website went down this morning due to demand from shoppers for online deliveries.
Slots for supermarkets are either completely sold out or only available from early April.
Some supermarkets have introduced extra click and collect services, including Sainsbury’s.
Closures of cafe’s in-store and fresh counters
Asda and Sainsbury’s have so far announced closures to in-store cafe’s and fresh food counters such as fish and meat.
The measure is to help supermarket’s move resources back in to shop floors so they can
We’ll update this story when we hear back from other supermarkets.
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