Grocery store shelves emptier in Albuquerque after troubles at nationwide distributor

Eggs, tortilla chips, yogurt, bottled water. That’s not a grocery list — those were products missing from shelves, or in short supply — at the Whole Foods Market on Wyoming Monday afternoon.

These shortages, being seen across the country, are the aftermath of an information technology disruption at United Natural Foods, or UNFI, a food distributor in both the U.S. and Canada.

Thursday the company noticed “unauthorized activity” on its IT servers which halted distribution nationwide, UNFI wrote in a report to the Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday morning.

“The incident has caused, and is expected to continue to cause, temporary disruptions to the company’s business operations,” the report continued.

A Whole Foods spokesperson apologized for disruptions to customers, but declined to elaborate further on the severity of the food shortage.

UNFI says it supplies 300,000 stores across the U.S. and Canada, ranging from corporations like Whole Foods to local stores like the La Moñtanita Co-op. UNFI could not be immediately reached for comment. The cause and severity of the IT problems are unknown.

After shipments stopped, some products went out of stock at the Co-op, although spokesperson Lea Quale said the store was largely "insulated" due to their relationship with local farmers, ranchers and businesses. The Co-op last received a UNFI shipment Thursday, the day of the malfunction, and were told by UNFI that disruptions may continue over the course of the week.

"We are in close contact with our UNFI representative and are keeping customers updated as they work to restore their systems," Quale said.

Summer of scarcity

This shortage comes amid a projected summer of scarcity after President Donald Trump's tariffs have stirred uncertainty in the market, and cut down shipments to the U.S.

At the Port of Los Angeles, shipments dropped 25% in May and hundreds of longshoremen went without work, the Los Angeles Times reported this week. And until the prospect of trade wars with China and other countries are clearer, trade isn’t likely to return to full steam in the near future.

As Trump seeks to renegotiate better terms in what he calls highly imbalanced trade agreements, particularly with the world’s second-largest economy China, Chinese exports in May plummeted 34.5% year-over-year, the steepest drop since the beginning of the pandemic.

Even with trade negotiators working frantically on an agreement, turning back on that spigot is a slow process that can take up to 8 months, meaning U.S. Consumers will start to experience a disruption this summer no matter the outcome of the talks.

Meanwhile, domestic supply chain disruptions caused by bird flu to computer hacks continue to compound the problem.