People and businesses across the Carolinas are preparing for the worst as Hurricane Florence moves closer to the states.
Grocery stores across Charlotte are working to keep bottled water, milk, eggs, bread, batteries, flashlights, pet supplies and canned meats on the shelves.
“We’re pretty well stocked on that right now, and we get trucks throughout the week pretty much every day so hopefully we should be able to stay in stock throughout the rest of the week,” said Mitch Hendrix, store manager at Food Lion on Park Road.
Plenty of people in Charlotte were taking extra precautions with a trip to the store Monday. Gloriane Pierre said she has been through hurricanes when she lived in Florida, so she isn’t taking any chances this time.
“You might not have electricity, or you might have a lot of water or no gas, no food, just be prepared,” Pierre said.
Blackhawk Hardware tried to keep up with the customer demand Monday as people came in looking for flashlights and batteries.
"We've sold every flashlight I had,” said Larry Kitzinger, a sales associate. “I went down and dug some out that I had left from last year."
Kitzinger said the store doesn’t usually carry generators, but it's expecting a shipment of about 100 on Tuesday to accommodate the number of phone calls the store has been receiving about them.
Lowe’s on South Boulevard is also working to help people keep the power going and weather the storm.
“It’s been a wild day,” said Gary McCoy, store manager. “We’ve had waves of people in and out all day, people really looking to be prepared for the storm.”
McCoy said the store opened for business on Monday with 40 generators, which were all gone by lunchtime. It received another 100 by dinnertime. McCoy said he hopes that supply lasts them through Tuesday morning.
“If you need supplies, to go ahead and get them now,” McCoy said. “As the forecast changes and as the hurricane comes into landfall, our supplies will dwindle dramatically.”
Alex Hannah, owner of Golden Cow Creamery, stopped by Lowe’s to pick up two generators for his ice cream shops, hoping it saves the ice cream during the hurricane.
“The concern is that we lose power for more than about six hours,” Hannah said. “We lose power longer than that, we’re going to start handing ice cream away for free, or it’s going to melt.”
