Food Storage Makeover: Disaster Kits

We’re so excited about our Extreme Makeover: Food Storage Edition project we are working on with Grandma Lori. We decided to start with getting her Disaster Kits put together. Disaster kits consist of a 3 day supply of food, water, and emergency items). As we went through our Emergency Preparedness worksheets we realized that they might not be ideal for every situation (including Grandma Lori’s). We came up with the following 3 options to discuss with her:

Pros
Inexpensive – if you have a lot of the first aid and emergency items on hand already and purchase food items in bulk at the grocery store
Flexibility – Freedom to choose foods for your 72 hour kits that suit your family’s needs and preferences
Cons
Time intensive – Inventorying your materials on hand can take a while, plus the added time of going to the store to purchase any items still needed
Hard to find – Some items may be hard to find if you don’t have a specialty preparedness store near your home

Pros
Convenience – No need to think or plan, everything you need is available all in one kit, including food and water and backpacks to carry it in
Cons
Expense – Buying everything new could potentially be more expensive then looking for good sales prices or using things you already have

Some good places to look for ready-made-kits are Emergency Essentials or American Family Safety.

Pros
Personalized – Some people like the kit for emergency supplies, but still prefer to put in real food for 72 hour kits
More complete – Any items not included in a purchased kit can be added in as a supplement
Cons
Consideration – Takes a little more thought then just purchasing a pre-made kit

If you are at the stage to be putting together your Disaster Kits you may wish to consider these three options. We will be going into more details on the three options in the future as we revamp our Disaster Kits page.

Make sure to stay tuned next Monday for the next video in this series to see what Grandma Lori decided on and to see the results of the first phase of her Food Storage Makeover!