Everyone that practices
emergency preparation and storage usually ends up wondering how long will their
supplies last. The way I answered
that question is that when I open a product, such as shampoo, I take a permanent marker and I write the “opened” date on the container. Whenever the contents become used up, I mark
that date down in my record of supplies.
Count the number of days from “opened” to “used up” and there you
go!
I have used this "opened" date method for
accurately finding out how long several of my items actually last. That enables
me to be prepared for specific lengths of time to have my prepping supplies serve my
needs. I suggest that you try doing the
same thing to find out how long your own supplies will last. For example, that shampoo of mine lasted a
specific amount of time, but I was the only person using it. My wife doesn’t like the shampoo I use, so
she uses another brand. Yesterday I used up that shampoo that I opened on the 20th of October 2014. Calculating that period of time, I found that my daily use of shampoo in that sized container lasted me 132 days. Make note of how many people use the product you are tracking. That's important information when making quantity calculations.
Using this method accurately identifies the consumption rate of each product, whether it be shampoo, bar soap, laundry soap, catsup, cooking oil or whatever. Doing it this way you can plan your preps without having a glut of one product over another. Your preps will be very much more organized than before.
