We're not survivalists at all and I don't think it would be accurate to say that we're "stockpiling", but I come from a part of the country where frequent tornados and hurricanes are a fact of life.
So I'm used to having a couple of week's food on hand.
Now, we're pretty much self sufficient. We grow about 75% of our own food and barter for the rest. Bartering has a lot of advatages because we save a tremendous amount of money (you'd be amazed at how much a family of seven can pay for food when they buy it from the store every week), but it also means that we're not subject to market forces. That means that shortages will not affect us nearly as much.
One of the other pleasant by products of this is that the food we get is of much better quality. Because I'm doing business directly with the butcher (organic meat, no less) and because he and the grocer and I are in a kind of a partnership, it's in his best interest to take care of me.
That means I get cuts of meat that the public usually never even sees.
I can get steaks and cuts of beef that you would shoot your own mother for.
Another factor is that we live so far out in the country.
It's in my best interests to buy four or five cases of toilet paper at a time and to buy other things in such large quantities. And when I say "buy", I usually mean the credit that the grocer gives me for the produce I supply him with.
