Wipers, soup big sellers during cold snap

What did people purchase the most when the first winter storm of 2011 struck Nevada? Windshield wipers flew off the shelves. People stocked up on grocery staples and grocers had a hard time keeping shelves stocked with soup. Some opted to have dinner delivered instead, as indicated in an upswing in local pizza delivery. According to the National Weather Service, the precipitation is over for now, but extremely cold temperatures are expected to persist through Thursday.

It happens every year; the weather gets bad and people make a rush to their favorite grocery or auto parts stores to stock up on groceries or buy something for the car. This year is no different, and the first winter storm of the season has created an increase in sales for some local merchants.

Everyone has to eat and the threat of winter weather sends people to the store to stock up on the groceries they use the most. Thanks to the weather men forecasting this storm well in advance the Woods' Supermarket in Nevada "had a tremendous week," last week according to assistant manager Charlie Simpson.

Simpson said the pattern of shopping just before a storm is typical in the retail grocery business. And so are the things customers buy. "They buy the essentials; bread, milk, things like that," said Simpson. Soup is evidently one of those items, too; because Simpson said that they had a hard time keeping soup in the store. All kinds of soup sold well, but the store's inventories of those and other items has been replenished and the store is waiting for the next onslaught of bad weather.

The delivery drivers of both Pizza Hut and Dominoes Pizza are also waiting for more foul weather. According to John Bonderet of the Pizza Hut call center in Pittsburg, Kan., delivery sales and carry out both saw an increase during the past few days.

Dominoes manager Daniel Day said his business has increased too, "yesterday was pretty busy." But Day also said that all it takes for him to see an increase in orders is a storm warning. It doesn't matter if it's rain or snow; bad weather makes good business. Day said that even though they will not deliver to the ordinary three mile distance, orders are still up. He just doesn't like sending his drivers out that far; he has had some of them end up with their delivery cars in ditches.

Even if the driver has been to the auto parts store ahead of the storm, it won't help them with slick roads. A lot of people wait until a storm hits before going to the parts store to get winter items for their car. This past spate of bad weather saw a run on windshield wipers at the O'Rielly's Auto Parts store in Nevada. According to Karen Lamke, the store was having a sale on wipers, but "it really picked up after it started snowing." Lamke also said that de-icers were selling well as were fuel additives.

Other parts stores didn't report having noticed as much of an increase in sales, but some of the predictable items did sell a little better because of the weather.

All of the stores contacted said their inventories were in good shape or would be in time for the next spell of bad weather, which is sure to create another surge of shoppers buying things they need to make it through the storm.