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Tour buses descend on regional towns to 'strip supermarket shelves bare'

Panic buying hysteria has hit regional areas with tour buses of people showing up from cities to strip supermarket shelves of sought after products.

It comes as one Foodworks has made the drastic move amid the coronavirus outbreak to call on customers to show ID as they enter stores to prove they live locally.

One woman tweeted she lives in a small town with a population of 1500 people, about 100 kilometres from Melbourne, where buses of people arrived on Tuesday.

“Yesterday four tour buses arrived from Melbourne and 200 people descended on our supermarket and stripped the shelves of everything. Not. One. Foodstuff. Left,” she wrote.

Riddells Creek Foodworks, between Melbourne and Bendigo, wrote on Facebook it would have “no other choice but to enforce very strict conditions for entry into our store”.

“You will now be asked for ID proof that you life in the following areas – Riddells Creek, Clarkfield, Monegeetta, Bolinda, Romsey, Lancefield, Sunbury Riddell Road up to and including Settlement Road (from Riddells Creek End), Gisborne, New Gisborne, Cherokee,” it said.

“We apologise for any inconvenience this will cause. Unfortunately, due to the current situation, we can only accommodate customers living in these areas.”

Pictured is an empty milk fridge at Kinglake Foodworks. Source: Instagram
The owner of Kinglake Foodworks claims people from Melbourne have been snatching up products from her store. Source: Instagram

It later wrote in a separate post it wasn’t a decision the supermarket wanted to make and was trying to avoid these great measures.

“Keep in mind Riddells Creek is only a small township, so our first option could well have been to only accept customers living in Riddells Creek,” the Foodworks said.

“Knowing we have customers who are regular weekly shoppers with us that live outside of Riddells Creeks, restricting them just wasn’t going to happen. But we had to make the decision as to where the cut off point was.

“We are simply trying to do the best we can given the situation. We, like all other stores, have limits in place across the store. We also are still out of stock of a number of items. Deliveries are delayed.”

The owner of Foodworks in Kinglake, about 50 kilometres northeast of Melbourne, also announced its deliveries had to be cut back.

“We ask our customers to show compassion, support and respect to our staff members and others during these tough times,” it wrote on Facebook.

“We are working hard to ensure we have stock on our shelves however our deliveries have been cut back.

“We cannot control if a particular product is unavailable due to the current conditions and we are doing our best to ensure we have supplies for you all.”

Foodworks owner Dora Kordos told ABC News people had been arriving from as far as Essendon in Melbourne’s northwest to snatch up their products.

Pictured is an empty meat fridge at Kinglake Foodworks.
Kinglake Foodworks have had to cut back its deliveries amid the coronavirus outbreak. Source: Instagram

“We’ve seen people from Essendon. People we’ve never seen before. Somebody shared on the Eltham Facebook page that we were fully stocked and we’ve been inundated from all over the state,” she said.

“It started on Friday but it ramped up this week. Monday’s takings were three times what a normal Monday would do.”

Ms Kordos compared them to a “swarm of locusts” who were stripping shelves bare, leaving nothing for regulars.

Prime Minster Scott Morrison has called on Australians to stop hoarding supermarket items in a blunt rebuke of those seen stripping supermarket shelves in recent weeks.

In an address announcing new public measures on Wednesday morning, the PM slammed those engaged in bulk purchasing of food and toilet paper as “unAustralian”.

“On bulk purchasing of supplies. Stop hoarding,” he said.

“I can't be more blunt about it. Stop it.

“It is not sensible, it is not helpful and it has been one of the most disappointing things I have seen in Australian behaviour in response to this crisis.

“That is not who we are as a people.”

Pictured are empty fruit and vegetable shelves in an Australian supermarket after coronavirus panic buying.
Empty fruit and vegetable shelves in an Australian supermarket after panic buying due to the COVID-19 Coronavirus. Source: Getty

Woolworths told Yahoo News Australia it would not be asking customers for ID despite the extraordinary level of demand for groceries in recent weeks.

Our teams and suppliers are working round the clock to replenish stock levels for food and groceries as quickly as possible,” a spokesperson said.

“We’ve made some further changes to the maximum number of products customers can buy, in addition to 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 regardless of brand or variety.

“There are exceptions to this, with no limits currently on fruit and vegetables, fresh milk and easter confectionary.

“We ask customers to please respect the limits and only buy what they need to help as many Australians as possible access the products they need.”

Yahoo News Australia has contacted Coles for comment.

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