More Shelf Reliance

One of the owners of Shelf Reliance saw my post from last night about the food storage planning tool. He wanted to clear up some key points and actually left a very substantive comment on the blog. I don't know that any of you actually read the comments, and since I feel Mr. Palmer's remarks are important, I am posting exerpts here along with further commentary.

First up, I am happy to inform you that all orders over $199 are shipped free of charge.

Second, 

It is very true that many of the items that we carry can be found for much better pricing. Anyone willing to do their own canning at the local Dry Pack, for example, will find pricing that doesn't compare to what you will find through an emergency company. It's always a good idea to look for items on sale and store them on your own when possible.

I find it heartening that Mr. Palmer is encouraging people to pursue a less expensive alternative, even though it may harm his sales a bit.

Third, and this is one of the points I tried to convey, 

Some customers find it convenient to just get everything at once. THRIVE Food Storage is definitely a premium name and you are paying for higher quality. Because we teach people to use their food storage, we need to make sure it tastes great:) We also offer some 60 foods more than is available through the Dry Pack.

And finally, 

Our packages are built around a 2000 calorie diet. Most companies try to sell you a "year supply", but if you were to dig into the details you will find that they calories per day won't keep you alive very long. The buckets sold at Costco are a prime example of this. For $100 you can buy a 'three month' supply of food, but when you do the math you have to live off of 460 calories a day.

First off, thank you Mr. Palmer for taking the time to provide some color on this topic. You obviously care a great deal about your products and the reputation of your company. As I told Mr. Palmer personally via email, I like Shelf Reliance a lot, and I hope that sentiment was conveyed in the original post.

I think it is safe to say that THRIVE may not be a solution for everybody, but it is definitely a solution for somebody. Everything has a cost associated with it. It took me several hours of my time to build my #10 can rotating system/workbench. What is my time worth? There is a price beyond the cost of the food to go to the dry-pack. Also, as Mr. Palmer elluded to, there are quite a number of THRIVE foods in my free food storage plan that are not available elsewhere (dry, in #10 cans - to my knowledge).

• Sweet corn
• Mushrooms
• Carrots
• Raspberries
• Strawberries
• Bananas
• Apples
• Cheese
• Tomatoes
• Chicken bouillon
• Butter

THRIVE's solution may seem expensive to me. But for somebody who wants to get the job done without worry, hassle, time, travel, shopping, effort, etc., Shelf Reliance offers a viable solution that definitely has value.

Shelf Reliance's Planning Tool

I've been waiting for something like this for a long time.

One short form. Two EASY questions. Done and done.

Shelf Reliance has a food storage planning tool on their web site. It's new to me. I discovered it in connection with Shelf Reliance's new "Thrive Q" pay-as-you-go food storage acquisition program.

Now, I'm certainly not a shill for Shelf-Reliance or, more specifically, its Thrive product line - they tell me a 12 month supply of their full product line will run me $7,500, plus shipping! Just like their line of food rotation systems, you're paying a BIG premium for the convenience of their products (which are, admittedly, VERY convenient).

In other words, I'm a fan of their products. We own several of their "Cansolidator Pantry" units which work great for small cans in our kitchen pantry. (Buying tip: These particular units are available at our local Costco at a substantial discount versus buying them directly from Shelf Reliance - <$25 at Costco vs. $36 (plus shipping) on sale from Shelf Reliance.) Long-time readers will also recall my inexpensive, home-made and improved (for my needs) alternative solution to their Harvest 72" #10 system.

While I like Shelf Reliance's products a lot, I think their prices make for a bittersweet irony. Food storage in general is founded on principles of provident living, saving for a rainy day, preparing for the unknown. Yet, acquiring most any of their products would violate those very principles for a large portion of their potential customer base. 

Consider that the 2006 median household income for a family of five in Oregon (where I live) was roughly $60,000. The $7,500 food cost plus estimated $1,675 in storage cost (5 racks x $335 ea.) would bring the one year total for my family to $9,175 (plus shipping), or 15% of median family income. That's a HUGE investment. Granted, it IS an investment and it does not need to be acquired in just a one year period. But the overall investment is almost like buying two additional years' worth of groceries (at a $100/wk rate). 

This brings me to my point: Shelf Reliance's food storage planning tool is fast and free. I first told it how many people there are in my family, along with the age and gender of each person. I then specified the number of months I wanted it to calculate. That's it! The next page was a detailed plan of all of the food the company thinks my family needs, along with details of each (description, weight, price and extended weight and price based on quantity.) It is easy to email the list to yourself. You can also adjust the plan to account for 1) personal preferences, or 2) inventory you may already have. Now I have a checklist/shopping list for my own inventory.

There is no obligation to buy the food from Shelf Reliance. And this is where the premium price for convenience comes into play. An example: Sugar. Shelf Reliance estimates my family will need 225 lbs of sugar for 12 months. I can buy it from them in 39 #10 cans for a total of $430 (plus shipping). Alternatively, that same sugar, but in 25 lb bags, would cost me about $112 at Costco or a comparable local source.

On the one hand, Shelf Reliance's solution is conveniently packaged, durable and ready to store long-term. I just have a hard time reconciling the $350 price difference (and that's just for the sugar). I could buy my own dry-pack can sealerwith the savings.

Shelf Reliance

Ever since we went to the dry-pack for the first time we've had a problem: How to store all of those boxes. We've got the space for them. but keeping the #10 cans in their six-pack cases was not working for us - too much shifting and restacking whenever we needed to find a particular item.

Enter Shelf-Reliance

Surely by now you have seen these heavy-duty canned food racks from Shelf-Reliance. They look awesome. They are industrial strength with retail-style features, most notably how they allow you to rotate your food so that you're always using the oldest stuff first so you don't get stuck with a 20 year-old can of nastiness. FIFO, or "first in, first out," is the accounting term for this type of inventory management system.

There are several different setups, but the one I've had my eye on for the past couple of years is the Harvest 72" #10, denoting it's six foot height and that it stores #10 cans. In fact each unit holds 112 #10 cans. A big 'BUT' - each unit retails for $460! Yowsers! Occasionally I find a discount code for $75 off, $100 off, or free shipping. I even came really close to placing an order at one point.

I hesitated because I was considering additional details like where to put them in the garage and how many racks I would need just to store all of the cans I already had in boxes, in addition to the non-trivial price. 

The only place that made sense to put the racks was in the same place I intended to build a workbench. So...

- A trip to Home Depot

- 15 2x4s

- 3 4x4s

- a bunch of 5/16" hex bolts, washers, nuts and nails

... and, viola!

My self-shelf-reliance holds 231 #10 cans (a bit more than twice as many as the Harvest 72" #10). It cost less than $100 in materials. I would have needed to buy two Harvests ($920) to equal the storage capacity I built for $100. Plus, my homebrew Harvest is more practical for me. I sized it such that it is the same height as my table saw, allowing me to use it as a workbench/outfeed table. When loaded up with food, it is also very heavy which makes for a nice sturdy work surface. 

The dimensions are approximately eight feet wide by three and a half feet deep by however high to the top of my table saw. This allowed for three levels of cans, seven cans deep and eleven across (3 x 7 x 11 = 231). I had orginally envisioned four levels of cans, which would have increased capacity by 77 cans, but I decided the value of having it match the height of my table saw was worth more to me. Like the rack from Shelf Reliance, the rails on mine are slightly angled so that the cans roll to the front. Like the rack from Shelf Reliance, my system employes FIFO inventory management, with the ability to load cans from the back of the unit.

I still need to add the table surface, and there is plenty of room directly underneath the suface for drawers and a woodworking vise, which I intend to add at some point in the not-too-distant future.

Perhaps the best part is that my system holds all of my current inventory, with some capacity left unused. It is easy to see exactly how much we have of particular item, and use that information to determine the amount we still need to acquire. I take that back - the best part is that Sara actually likes it and doesn't think (not anymore, anyway) this project was a waste of time. I take that back again - the best part is that we can now walk all the way around the car when it is parked in the garage now that the boxes of food are out of the way. Ah, nevermind. I think the first one really is the best. Organization has a way of making a person feel in control of things. I won't be blindsided with surprise about what I have or don't have in my dry-pack inventory.