Every Day Preparedness Shopping

Over the last few years, Survivalism, "Doomsday" prepping and the Zombie Apocalypse have become very popular. And with the Zombie craze, the amount of cool tools, weapons and equipment has virtually exploded. I love these topics and spend a good deal of time studying them. However, for my daily needs, a lot of it seems a bit unrealistic.

My thing is Every Day Preparedness. I want to have everything I need for any type of situation, emergency or otherwise, that might pop up without warning. And whereas supplies related to the above topics can be really cool and useful, they might also be expensive and require shopping at specialty stores or online. I want to know where I can find anything I need at just about any time, so I am constantly looking for emergency preparedness-type items everywhere I shop. I am often very surprised at what I find when I start really looking. For example; I looked all over for some camo printed duct tape and finally found it at my local Price Chopper.

Besides the obvious (food, water, etc.), your local supermarket carries a TON of useful items, and they are not necessarily more expensive than big box stores. I was shopping this morning and this is what I found:

Pretty much every supermarket has a section like this one. Sometimes it's also next to the automotive supplies.

In this tiny section I found gloves, dust masks, duct tape, super glue, rope, twine, sandpaper, zip ties, all kinds of hand tools - including pliers, screwdrivers and utility knives, and lots of different fasteners. Just to the right I also found sewing kits and lighter fluid.

 

Here is a similar section at a different Price Chopper:

Hobby Lobby has a good selection of 550 cord. It's good quality cord, made in USA. They have 16 foot hanks for $1.99 and 100 foot hanks for $8.99. That's a good deal for 100 feet. They have a good selection of colors including Coyote Brown, OD and Black, plus hi-viz colors like Neon Green and Neon Orange:

Sorry for the crappy iPhone pics, but you should get the idea. Shopping for preparedness items doesn't have to mean running all over town. You can pick up a couple of things at a time while you are grocery shopping. And don't forget the "travel-size" aisle - lots of packable hygiene items can be found there. Other places to keep your eyes open are; drug stores, convenience stores, hardware stores, auto parts stores and so on. The point is to develop a preparedness mindset and an eye for useful resources.  And have fun!

Semper Paratus