The American food distribution system

Most of what we're carrying in our trailers is food. Typically, we're picking it up from a producer or packager and then delivering it to some regional distribution center. Typically, both pickups and deliveries happen in the middle of the night (or if during the day, during a time I'm asleep) so I have not yet taken any good photos of the outsides of these facilities. Future post. But the other night we made a delivery of 17 tons of cheese to a C+S Wholesale Grocers distribution center in . . . I honestly don't remember where it was. Hmmm. . . . which we'd picked up in . . . don't recall that either. Yes, the days and nights and loads are blurring together.

Anyways, this is the guy who unloaded our truck, called a "lumper",

with the distribution facility behind him. Look at the SIZE of this place ! ! ! (click on the photo to enlarge it) See how far back those stacks go? I think this is where they're keeping the ark of the covenant.

That was a few days ago. Since then we carried fifteen tons of brownies and cakes; twenty tons of ham from Illinois to Mississippi; frozen chickens from Mississippi to Laredo Texas for eventual delivery to somewhere in Mexico; seventeen tons of broccoli (behind me right now), from Mexico (which we picked up in Laredo) to near Cleveland.

Yup. This is the best part of the job. Seeing stuff like this almost everyday.

The highlight of my driving so far was carrying 17 tons of Twizzlers from the factory in which they're made near Hershey Pennsylvania to a Hershey's distribution center near Chicago. (I actually met one of the oompa-loompas who make them.) I LOVE Twizzlers and when the guard at the yard in Chicago overheard me saying to another driver that I didn't get a free sample, he found one for me. The best, freshest Twizzlers I'd ever eaten. Ya gotta get 'em fresh.

Here's what concerns me. Our entire food distribution system is based on the availability and affordability of diesel fuel. With diesel now over $4/gallon and no reason it should ever decrease in price, soon the prices of food transported by this fleet of trucks will also have to increase. At what point do people realize it's actually less expensive (and healthier and more fun at farmer's markets) to buy the bulk of their food from local suppliers? Will local grocery stores begin selling food produced by local suppliers? (Have they?) Could local food producers scale up to supply enough food for the ENTIRE local population if need be? What would it be like to not have broccoli from Mexico in New England in April? (Or, God forbid, no Twizzlers from Pennsylvania!) I've had some absolutely fabulous locally grown New Hampshire mushrooms in January. What other vegetables (plant life?) could be grown throughout a New England winter?