The Third Rule of Prepping

Wes’s third rule of prepping is smaller is better. On the surface, the local Buy More looks like a prepper’s paradise, and it can be if it is used correctly. A wholesale warehouse full of all the items you want at a good price is tempting indeed. But unless you are running a restaurant or soup kitchen, the only things you should be buying in bulk are those things you can break down into smaller, even single-serve, portions.

Whose heart doesn’t skip a beat when you spy that thirty-pound pail of mayonnaise or forty-five-pound tub of peanut butter? Imagine the sandwiches you can make with a sixty-five-ounce can of your favorite tuna. And there is the endless supply of everything freeze-dried in #10 cans. Emergency pantries from here to Timbuktu are full of these items. While they look good on the shelf, and give you the warm and fuzzies for your preparedness level, these things are very impractical in an actual emergency situation.

First, they are very difficult to do food rotation properly. Wes’s second rule of prepping is store what you eat, eat what you store. The bulk of your daily food consumption should be coming from your food stores. You eat from your stores and replace what you eat. This ensures that if the emergency you have been prepping for ever happens you will be eating fresh food that you enjoy and not twenty-year old rice and beans. Unless you are feeding a football team, it is difficult to use all of the food that comes in a bulk container before it goes bad. In the end you lose the money you saved by buying in bulk by throwing out an unused portion you couldn’t eat.

Having your food supply in smaller containers makes it far easier to do rationing if you were ever forced to do so in an extreme food shortage. Once a bulk item is opened it has to be used before it goes bad. Bulk storage does not lead itself well to food rationing.

If you heard the government or other malefactor were going around confiscating food stores from those who have them it is easier to hide smaller containers of food in many places to protect your hard-earned investment. There are few places you can hide a thirty-pound bucket of mayonnaise.

While bugging in is generally the right choice, there are times and circumstances when one has to evacuate to a safer location. Never bug out without taking enough supplies to survive on for a few days. Chances are that you will not have to use your supplies but it is better to have some go-to food on you and not need it than to go hungry. When all that is in your prepper pantry are items in bulk and large #10 cans you are restricted to what and how much you can take with you. It is easier to throw a bunch of single-serve items into a bag. This gives you a variety of things to choose from if you are forced to eat what you brought with you. This can be a great comfort in a bad situation.

Unless you have the heart of the grinch before Christmas morning, you are going to want to be able to help others who are in greater need than yourself. That is easier to do when you can grab a small can of peanut butter, a box of spaghetti noodles, a small jar of sauce, and maybe a can of corn off the shelf and give them something to make a meal with. That becomes much harder when you only have #10 cans of freeze-dried broccoli or sixty-ounce cans of tuna. Remember, the life you save may be your own.

If things ever got bad enough that we end up in a barter society, have highly desired items in small sizes can give you a better bater position. You don’t have to give away the farm to get something of lesser value in return. Why give away a 5th of your favorite bourbon when all it takes is two or three mini bottles to get what you want in return?

There are things that make sense to store in bulk, but when it comes to your prepper pantry smaller is better.