So I just made a trip to Costco as it was time to buy eggs again. I figured while I was there I would pick up some powdered sugar. I buy the 50lb bags and can go through that pretty quickly. Well as I searched and searched I couldn't find the bags anywhere!!!!
When I was checking out I asked one of the manager guys what the deal was. I was told that we are now experiencing a Powdered Sugar Shortage along with Rice and Oil.
ACKKKKKKKKKKK!!!!!!!!!!!!
He said that I'll be lucky to find it anywhere and if I do it's going to cost an arm and leg.
Has anyone else run into this issue and where on earth can you find bulk powdered sugar that is not expensive??
Oh, no!! Say it isn't so!!! 
My Krogers hasn't been having as much powdered sugar stock lately either. They do have the Domino brand though most of the time stocked. I think this may be because I shop late at night when they are stocking and there is a bakery in the same small plaza that gets LOTS of order (around 40 or more a week) She goes there and wipes them out of powdered sugar and box mixes-doesn't matter which kind as long as they are on sale. I'll see here there with carts just throwing everything in.
I'll ask next time I'm there about the powdered sugar though.
I'll have to check it out. I'm in northen NC close to the VA line and it is already hard to get what you need.
I'm in Idaho, and about two months ago I started having trouble finding enough powdered sugar at Walmart. I thought it was just me! They seem to be better stocked with the store brand these days. When I asked why, everyone just shrugged their shoulders.
I'm checking sams club. They have the 50lb bag for a little over $22. Is that expensive? I've never bought in bulk..
How do you store it? measure it? ect.....
If I get it at the grocery store, it's $1.19 for a 2 lb bag. So that makes the 50# at Sam's a good deal. I store mine in really big Tupperwares and ice cream buckets. I got a really cheap food scale that I use to measure back the 2# per recipe when I make my icing. My Sam;s doesn't always carry the 50# bags, so I go to my local grocery store which has a bakery and deli. I used to work in the deli, so I just sweet talk them into ordering anything I might need. I also get my eggs from them and gallons of Whirl. (If you've never used Whirl, I use it like Cake Release, only it's about $10 a gallon. Cake release is about $48 a gallon if you do the math.) Hope that helps.
Restaurants use whirl as a cheap substitute for drawn butter in seafood dishes. So do you add anything to it for the cake release?
Restaurants use whirl as a cheap substitute for drawn butter in seafood dishes. So do you add anything to it for the cake release?
We used it at the deli to grease the grill for the morning breakfast run! LOL I don't add a thing. I put it on with a pastry brush slightly thicker than the Cake Release and the cakes flip out of the pans so nice. No crumbs either. Works just like the Wilton stuff. (In fact, I pour it in my used Cake Release bottles so I can squirt it on the pans easier. I just put masking tape over the label so I know which is which.) The only pans I use CR for are the shaped ones with all the tiny crevices. Whirl doesn't quite work for that. But the rounds, sqquares and sheets are great!
its always interesting to see the prices of products in other places.
Here for about 2lbs of powdered sugar it would cos us about $2.68 in US dollars
It cost me between $1.50-$2.00AU, it depends which brand i buy though..
I'm in TX and I too buy the 50lb bag at Costco. It is usually around $21/$22.
For those of you who buy the 50lb bag at Sam's, make sure you check the number of times that is on the bag. You want at least a 10X (last time I checked, Sam's was a 6X) The lower the "x" the higher amount of cornstarch in the powdered sugar. 
Happy baking!
I read several articles about food supplies and cost of food that has gone up from 40% to over 100% in the last 2 years to 5 weeks.
In the last year the cost of egg did double and a few months ago, I went to Costco and they were completely out of eggs. They said there was a shortage??? I remember last summer they ran out of milk, they said the trucks were late! Oh well.
A few articles say wholesalers are rationing certain items.
Good Luck.
I picked up a 4 lb. bag at Meijers today for 2.68. No sign of a shortage here.
That's so weird - here our eggs at Costco have actually gone down from about $23 to $15.49 per 15 dozen. They are a lot more expensive at the grocery store though. No talk of shortage (knocking on wood!) of either powdered sugar or eggs. God help me if they do!
I typically buy the 50 lb bags. I weight it out to 7 pounds since I have a 7 qt mixer and use the SS icing recipe. I put it in food savor bags and seal it. No air stays fresh and I know I only need one bag per recipe which saves me a lot of time and mess!
Costco did have the bags for 19.99 but recent went up to about 22.00 a bag which breaks down to .44 a pound. I did see that they still had the 7 pound bags for 3.85 which breaks down to .55 a pound. I'm a small business and I try to save money on this type of ingredient. When your small every penny counts!
I'm in indiana and it's about $1.99 for a 2 pound bag. I will go nuts if we run out of it!
My Sam's has the 7lb bag for $3.69, which works out to about $0.53/lb. I buy it by the case..... 40+ lbs at a time. Haven't noticed a reduced supply at Sam's or at GFS. The last time I bought it at Walmart, it was $1.26 for a 2-lb bag. But that was the Feb' 08 price .... haven't really looked at it recently.
What a great idea sassy! I, like you, watch every penny, which is why I buy in bulk. I never thought of weighing out the bags and putting them through the food saver - I'm definately going to try that. Not only do I need to save pennies, but it seems like I'm running out of minutes too.
I like doing it that way, this way I'm assured there will be no buggies in sugar or attracted to the sugar because it is sealed. It still remains fresh. And although it may not seem as much of a time saver it is. I break the whole thing up at one time, which mean only having to pull the scale out once. Only making a mess once and only having to clean up a mess once. It makes storage a bit more manageable as I can stack the sealed flat bags in a tote which has a lid (I'm a bug a phobe...lol).
When it comes time to make icing I just pull out one bag and keep on going. No having to guess well was this the amount I need? My inspector liked the food savor idea because no bugs can find their way in. For anyone questioning the cost of the bags themselves, you can get the no name food savor bags from Walmart and they work just the same in your food savor machine.
A month or so ago this was on the news here (in NC, but I can't remember if it was on the national or state news). They said that sugar and rice are in short supply and that it would be "rationed" in the sense that you couldn't buy huge amounts at once. The next time I went to Sam's after seeing it, the large bags of sugar were still there, but I didn't see the giant bags of rice!
Yeah, right now I just have the air tight tote on wheels. We just dump the sugar, flour, powdered sugar, and shortening into the totes when they arrive. They are on wheels so it makes them moving it from station to station very easy...but we have a mess every day from the powdered sugar flying around when we measure it and the scale...well..don't get me started! LOL...I like the idea of only having the mess once also. Thanks for sharing such a fabulous time and space saver idea!
i live in barbados and about two months ago there was a shortage of icing sugar here too!
i was so upset because, at that time, my preferred brand cost about USD$0.93 for 3 cups...and i had to buy the more expensive British brand at USD$2.89 for 4 cups!!!
I have heard of no shortage and there is no evidence of it here. I just purchased my usual this week and there were tons of bags to choose from. I think the guy is "pulling your leg." We would have heard about it if that was the case (just like with rice) and I just googled it and nothing popped up about it.
In fact, the rice shortage isn't as big a deal as the newspeople want you to believe either. It's all a big hype.
I have noticed at my local walmart that they never have their brand of powdered sugar anymore but they still have the name brands.
i've noticed that too the last 3 weeks I tried to buy some, the shelves had been empty. I was wodering what was going on. I just have one question-how on earth can we be having fuel, sugar, corn, rice, wheat and any other staple shortage all at the exact same time?
It was told to me by the manager at the local Sam's that the "shortage" issue has been blown way out of proportion. He said that since the diesel has gone up so drastically, the trucks aren't running as much or at least they're waiting for a FULL load before they deliver. He said that about 4 times a week they would get semi-trailers that were only half full. But now the half full trucks are waiting on a full load before they make their run to save on diesel.
But of course, since my husband was in the media for many years, we know how the media can magnify everything.
I think it mostly has to do with the diesel and truck deliveries.
He said that since the diesel has gone up so drastically, the trucks aren't running as much or at least they're waiting for a FULL load before they deliver. But now the half full trucks are waiting on a full load before they make their run to save on diesel.
Very true! In fact, they just raised the weight limit that truckers can carry here for this very reason.
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