Import shortages: the goods we can’t get for Christmas

A trampoline for Christmas might be too hard for Santa to deliver this year, as imports of some goods struggle to make it into stores.

Global supply disruptions wrought by Covid-19 have meant that many goods are still in containers, some on ships queueing in Auckland harbour, or unable to be air freighted because of the scarcity of passenger flights.

Items in short supply include bikes, electronics and whiteware.

Ben Goodale, chief executive of marketing agency Quantum Leap, said some of the shortages related to products that had become popular during lockdown, such as exercise equipment.

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‘’No one anticipated that demand and that just means the supply chain is stretched, so my advice to shoppers is if they want it, they should get in before someone else gets it.

‘’It shows we’re an island nation and we are so reliant on stuff coming in from overseas and that supply chain.”

Springfree Trampolines said demand for its goods had been so high since lockdown that customers were waiting up to eight weeks for orders.

‘’We’ve been sold out since June-July,” general manager Megan McKenzie said. ‘’We’ve never been in this predicament before.

She said the company owned a factory in China so it had the supply, but getting it to customers was the issue.

Ainslie Davies, manager of electrical store 100 Percent Albany, said shortages were ”pretty much across the board” for electrical goods at present.

There was quite a lot of stock for customers on hand. ‘’But if they’ve their heart set on a specific item, there could be a bit of a wait.’’

The latest iPhone 12 was particularly scarce, and a shortage of fridges were ‘’the big issue” ahead of summer.

In-demand items during lockdown, like breadmakers and freezers, were back in stock but chrome books were globally difficult to get.

The cycling community was also doing it tough. A spokesman for cycle chain Evo said that while he felt his chain was well placed for supply, ”stock’s getting pretty limited out there.’’

‘’We’ve got a lot of stuff sitting on boats out in the gulf.’’

Some retailers told Stuff they were experiencing waiting times of up to two months for orders to come in.

In the clothing sector, Hallenstein Glasson reported this week that it had had to air freight stock in because sea freight was so congested.

Certain brands of men’s shirts are reportedly in short supply, although menswear stores Stuff spoke to said the main thing was simply the slowness of deliveries.

Clare Bowden, of independent store Mandatory, said her shop only sold small runs of stock and also produced some shirts locally.

But ‘’there are less shirts made in New Zealand … the manufacture of shirts is not that common in New Zealand.’’ Stores that had dropped their orders anticipating less demand might be ”in a bit of a pickle’’.

Man to Man co-owner Robyn Clareburt said stock was certainly taking longer to arrive and strangely, there seemed to a shortage of plain white shirts. But Richard Harford of Harfords Menswear said the delays ”have not affected us dramatically”.

100 Percent’s Davies said the freight delays was a symptom of a wider issue. ‘’Basically when Covid hit, everyone changed their forecasts, they thought we’re not going to need any of this stock and they were pulling boats out of the water to service them.

‘’No one really thought we would get through relatively unscathed and people would be spending up large in retail.”