Ball dropped the ball

So apparently there's a shortage of canning jars and lids this summer. Not too surprising considering how many people have gardens because of lockdown.

What is surprising is that manufacturers like Ball and Kerr etc haven't ramped up production.

I've been gardening and canning for a few years now, im set for jars but coming up short on lids. They've been sold out in my area for at least a month.

Guess we'll be freezing alot, at least until baggies become scarce.

Plenty of canning supplies on eBay.

There was a Ball plant across from the Crown plant I worked at. It was shut down about 5 years ago.

Here is a tidbit about Ball that many folks don't know. Ball has or had (not sure if they still own ot or not) an aerospace division. Quote from Ball.........

Perhaps the most famous of our Hubble instrument is the Corrective Optics Space Telescope Axial Replacement (COSTAR) that helped correct Hubble’s hazy vision. We designed and produced the complex COSTAR optics in only 28 months instead of the typical 48. When COSTAR and JPL’s WFPC-2 camera corrected Hubble’s vision after the first servicing mission in 1993, Ed Weiler, NASA’s chief Hubble astronomer, said the telescope was "fixed beyond our wildest expectations."

In order to be competitive these days companies must run everything at maximum efficiency. From "just in time" delivery of both incoming raw materials and outgoing products to running plants 24x7.

Excess capacity is wasted dollars.

Works great until there is unpredictably in demand.

Most manufactures are not willing to make big investments in increased capacity that may takes years to put in place for fear that this level of demand is not permanent.

This is exacerbated by countries that normally would export to the US keeping supplies for their own use.

just obtained some lids for my sister off the bag.
what normally prices around 20-25 cents each is averaging around 50-60 cents each now, unless buying in huge quantities.
i told her she should have bought a bunch in the spring.

Yup, they are a client in Colorado. Ball and Kerr mason jars are now made by Rubbermaid, it seems.

My local Meijer store has them 12 lids for 2.49

Look up Tattler lids- USA made and infinatly reusable. I hear there's a bit of a learning curve, diff tightening procedure, but otherwise great.

not mine....https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/304293547468164

FWIW I was in a hardware store today and overheard a salesperson tell someone on the phone "no we do not have any Ball lids but Meijer (a regional super store Michigan, Ohio, etc., ) just got a large shipment of Ball products in".

May be worth checking it out if the store near you received a similar shipment..........just saying.

Mike