BizX, based in Bellevue, Washington, said its website traffic is up 30% just in the last few days. At International Monetary Systems in the Milwaukee area, traffic has doubled in the last two weeks compared with a typical full month. In Pittsburgh, exchange Green Apple Barter has seen a 20% rise in its membership in March, said President Justin Krane.
“A supply yard who has inventory sitting on the lot,” Krane said. “They asked, ‘Could you move inventory?’ A hotel property just got involved -- their occupancy rate is really getting hurt right now. Joining a network is going to give them another way to fill hotel rooms.”
Bartering between consumers is ramping up as well after people cleared grocery-store shelves and hoarded supplies at home. For now, it’s still being treated as a joke. A Twitter poll asked how many cans of beer a single roll of paper is worth (two or three cans was the most popular answer).
Laughter aside, barter of household items and food could more than double this year in the U.S., from $4 million to over $10 million, according to Richard Crone, CEO of payments expert Crone Consulting LLC.
Bartering has become especially popular with people who are most at risk to have severe forms of the highly contagious coronavirus and want to avoid stores.
Chell Garvin of Springfield, Missouri, 50, saw a post from a friend on Facebook who said she scored an 18-roll pack of toilet paper. Garvin contacted her, and exchanged an 18-count carton of eggs for two double rolls. She “cooks a lot, and she said she can’t find eggs anywhere,” Garvin said.
Allie Walker-Lavette, a 55-year-old living in Jacksonville, Florida, recently got a delivery of eggs -- an item her daughter had been looking for in vain. Walker-Lavette swapped a carton for an order of margaritas-to-go from a local restaurant.
If supply-chain shortages continue, “I do have a couple neighbors close by, I know I can come to them and say, ‘What do you have in your fridge?’” she said.
Grocery stores have said that shortages of supplies like toilet paper are only temporary. Still, Crone expects that the shortages could potentially give rise to new swapping consumer apps and marketplaces.
“There’s demand for products that aren’t on store shelves but are in people’s pantry or garage or second freezer,” Crone said. “What Uber did to enable a bunch of idle capacity with cars, this does this for the packaged goods supply chain. It’s a whole new supply chain.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.