Feeling the Crunch - Supply Chain Issues Affecting Local Entrepreneurs

Supply chain issues are hitting the shelves of businesses across Canada – and Campbell River is no exception.  An article in the Campbell River Mirror on February 22 highlighted this – drawing attention to the lack of potato chips on retailers' shelves and the root cause of this shortage of chips.  Potato chips are not the only thing missing. We heard on national news about the lack of Rice Krispies for Christmas baking (that shortage is still prevalent), car manufacturers in Ontario are hitting supply roadblocks (literal roadblocks in this case) and local small retailers and manufacturers are feeling the same crunch.   

Christine Lilyholm, owner of Stonehouse Teas, describes a typical day of securing supplies for her tea shop.  “Finding the supplies is one issue I have been noticing – I need to travel to 4 different stores in Campbell River to find the basic ingredients for our baking products such as frozen raspberries. The time it takes to gather all the supplies to make the items on our menu takes hours of running around each week.”   

These shortages are just the start of challenges that small business owners are facing.  As individual consumers, we can make the simple choice to switch from eating bananas to apples when the price increases 15 to20 per cent or when availability is limited. But when you walk up to get your favorite bubble tea, you assume it will still be on the menu at the same price as yesterday. This puts business owners in a bind.  

“You want to be able to provide a consistent product to your loyal customers, they come to rely upon it as a comfort. But what needs to be considered is that every aspect of that bubble tea has gone up in price. The fruit, the tapioca, the tea, the milk, the gas to get the products. Just in milk price increases, our bubble tea cost has increased by 25 cents per drink,” Christine explains.  “We are not passing that onto the customers yet, but it is digging into our bottom line.  If prices keep on this trend, then it could put many small businesses at risk of some difficult decisions.” 

Iona Wharton from French Creek Collective agrees with Christine’s remarks regarding supply chain issues and demands upon supplies. “The cost of goods has gone up – retailers are having to make the hard decision as to if and when they pass on those increases to the customers. That combined with it being the slowest January and February for sales in recent history is really hitting hard.”  

Canadian-made goods are easier to come by and the delays are shorter.  Iona stated that products coming out of Canada are shipping on time and the orders are complete, whereas anything coming from abroad has a six- to eight-week lead time and most of the orders are not being fulfilled. 

Cris Fletcher owns a small-scale CNC shop in Campbellton and stated that the need for on-demand manufacturing locally is remarkably busy, with more contracts being signed weekly.  But there are challenges in his type of business as well. “Supplies of certain metals for the CNC machines are being bought up en masse by the bigger corporations so the suppliers will not even give a quote.” 

Whether it means more empty space on shelves, finding alternate suppliers or products, adjusting prices or widening the search for our favourite crunchy snacks, breaks in the supply chain are likely to continue challenging businesses and consumers for some time yet. But amid all that uncertainty, one thing’s for sure: a little extra patience, flexibility and understanding will help us all weather this unpredictable storm a bit easier. 

Need help getting your business over this bump in the road? Let’s talk.