If you’re in need of mylar bags for your food storage system, you’d best order them now. The ability to get them is about to get much more difficult. Why? Amazon is now banning a large segment of them.
What happened?
Earlier this past week, Amazon sent out a notification to all sellers advertising mylar bags on the website. Part of their statement reads as follows:
“Due to regulatory requirements, all Mylar bags that are not clear or single-colored must be removed from the Amazon store by August 5, 2022. For more information on these requirements, go to Drugs and drug paraphernalia.”
So you’ll still technically be able to buy mylar bags, but they’ll have to either have a window in them or be see through. Bags like this and this will no longer be available as of early August. (Go here to shop for them while you still can.)
Why on earth is Amazon banning the typical mylar bag?
According to Amazon, they are banning mylar bags to combat drug trafficking. It’s been theorized this is because mylar is allegedly smell-proof (albeit, this theory was crafted after reading a nine-year-old Reddit post).
Mylar bags are a staple of the preparedness and homesteading community, commonly being used to vacuum seal food to keep it preserved for long periods of time. If spoons are used by heroin addicts, will they be banned by Amazon next? What will we do about syringes?
This decision comes right at the time as gardeners throughout the United States are pulling in and trying to preserve their harvests. Those with freeze dryers or who regularly vacuum seal their own food are going to be in something of a predicament if they can no longer get the mylar bags they’re used to from their main marketplace.
Random food facilities keep bursting into flames, the price of diesel for tractors has gone through the roof, trucking companies are having a hard time keeping employees, the WEF is gearing up to get people to eat bugs, and now there are difficulties in purchasing particular forms of food storage equipment.
This won’t be because there aren’t any mylar bags out there. It will be because one of the largest stores for gray mylar bags has suddenly decided that these are associated with drug smuggling.
(Don’t starve! Read our free QUICKSTART Guide to what to eat when the power goes out.)
What you’re going to see in the mylar bag market
There are three main things that are likely going to come out of this. For starters, there’s a good chance you’re going to see prices rise on gray mylar. If people are having a harder time gaining access to it, and if retailers have to set up shop on their own websites or find other avenues to sell their products, they’re going to pass those costs on to the end consumer.
Secondly, you’re going to have to hunt more to find mylar bags, if you want the original. Finding them on Amazon was easy. But now they aren’t going to be there, and you and everyone else on the planet that uses them is going to start having to hunt for them online.
If everybody knows about the same venues, that’s where everybody is going to shop. Amazon may have had well over a dozen different companies selling mylar bags in one convenient location (e.g., the website). What do you think the odds are that people know the names of every company that sold gray mylar bags on Amazon pre-ban?
Zilch.
People will shop where they know, and they aren’t going to know as many sources. We’ll show you some other retailers below, but the odds are they’ll get slammed with orders here in the very near future as well.
The third thing you may see from this is a run on mylar bags. People are already concerned with what they see in the world around them. But now that we add in difficulties with accessing something that will help them to keep their families alive in a time of food shortages?
People are going to do what they can to prevent that from happening. Everybody is going to want to buy mylar bags now – even people who would never have bought mylar bags in the first place. And really, can you blame them? Look at any type of other ban (even non-governmental) in history. Right before the ban goes into action, people buy up as much as they can. It’s just the way it goes.
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What are your alternatives?
Amazon is not the one and only resource that preppers can turn to here, thankfully. Do yourself and small business owners a favor and take note of the vendors who are currently selling them on Amazon. You may be able to contact them directly in the future. There are always options. If you don’t want see-through mylar bags, but want the original stuff, here are two of those options below…
Lehman’s
Everybody knows Lehman’s. They’re one of the most well-known stores out there when it comes to anything related to homesteading, gardening, or self-sufficiency. As you would expect, they keep mylar bags in stock. If you already have an order in the works from this company, you may want to add some mylar bags to your order as well.
ReadyMadeResources.com
This is the prepper’s version of Walmart. Ready Made Resources truly has everything you could ever hope for in regards to prepping, and their selection is truly astounding. This is a very pro-America company as well.
So what is really going on here? Why target mylar bags?
What are your thoughts? Why did Amazon suddenly ban the selling of some mylar bags? Are there other resources you know of to keep preppers supplied with mylar bags? Let us know what you’re thinking in the comment section.
Hat tip to Matt in Oklahoma
About Jeff
Jeff Thompson is an avid fisherman who likes to spend time sailing on his boat and reading while at sea.