A Southern Highlands senior has jested that it is time to start "gathering gum leaves" after being disappointed by the recently designated seniors' shopping hour.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Gordon Lewis said that he and his wife Bette decided to make the most of the early morning shop on offer by Woolworths on March 17.
However, he walked away from the experience frustrated by people behaving as though "the world is going to end in a month".
He said they went to the Bowral supermarket to do their shopping between the 7am and 8am time slot set aside specifically for the elderly and people with disabilities.
But he said they were quickly disappointed and he expected others would have felt the same.
"There were as many cars in the car park as you would see at a weekend," he said.
"The empty shelves amazed me."
And as far a toilet paper was concerned Mr Lewis said "you might as well forget about its and start gathering gum leaves."
Mr Lewis questioned whether it was wise to "ask the elderly, which I am, to get out at 7am to shop" considering the quickly changing situation with the coronavirus.
"The elderly are the most vulnerable to the virus, so the government states. Is it wise to ask them all to congregate together with all the more sneezing and coughing going on?" he said.
Mr Lewis said "my suggestion is to all stop. Stop and think what panic buying is doing and most times people are buying for the sake of buying."
A Woolworths spokesman told Southern Highland News that "while we've heard positive feedback from many stores across the country on our dedicated hour, we regret that many customers have been unable to get all the items they need."
"We're doing the very best we can to get more stock into our stores and onto shelves as quickly as possible in the face of unprecedented demand," he said.
"We will continue to operate the dedicated hour for the rest of the week and work hard to improve the experience along the way.
"As the situation continues to evolve, we've made some further changes to the maximum number of products customers can buy, in addition to any other limits already in place.
"There is now a per customer, per shop limit of two items from any single category on most packaged products across Woolworths Supermarkets and Metro stores and online.
"This means customers will only be able to buy two products from any single included category, regardless of the brand or variety. There are some exceptions where no limits remain, such as fruit and vegetables, fresh milk, baby food and easter confectionary."
Full details of limits and exclusions are available for customers to view at https://www.woolworths.com.au/updates
Woolworths' dedicated shopping hour for the elderly and people with disabilities is from 7am to 8am and will continue to March 20 at this stage.
Coles' dedicated shopping hours will also continue until March 20 from 7am to 8am.
We have removed our paywall from our stories about the coronavirus. This is a rapidly changing situation and we need to make sure our readers are as informed as possible. If you would like to support our journalists you can subscribe.
