Profiteering, not just watches

So down in Birmingham helping out our daughter as no2 grandson has Chicken Pox. We decide to walk to the local pharmacy for a bottle of Calomine Lotion. Response, sorry sold out.
There follows 6 phone calls to “ pharmacies near me” all negative inc Tesco.

Amazon sold out, so I look on Ebay, first hit a bottle of Asda Calomine lotion £29.99. Thats not all some clown wants £99 for a 250 ml bottle. Im sure these bottles are £3 max ordinarily.

Reason …..Its the chicken pox season

There is entrepreneurship and there is taking the pizz.

Makes a Moonswatch at £600 look excellent value.

Seems like particularly odious behaviour as you know these people will have gone into Tesco/ASDA/Wilko and bought the whole stock to re-flog on eBay which causes the shortage. Profiting on the misery of children. You'd hope karma catches up with them one day.

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Originally Posted by Christian

Seems like particularly odious behaviour as you know these people will have gone into Tesco/ASDA/Wilko and bought the whole stock to re-flog on eBay which causes the shortage. Profiting on the misery of children. You'd hope karma catches up with them one day.

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But, is it any different from investing in firms that still use child labour? Only mentioned as a talking point as I agree with neither...

It happened last June with those Beer cooler-dispensers.

The official retailer had huge waitlist, but there were loads on Ebay for RRP +£100.

But - for what could be called 'essentials' - that is truly dire.

Very frustrating and annoying. There are some possibilities on Amazon with next day delivery, albeit still more pricey at c£5+. E.g.
https://smile.amazon.co.uk/Eurax-Itc.../dp/B001IC5TLE
https://smile.amazon.co.uk/Witch-Exp.../dp/B08GCP5NDB

(I can order on your behalf if you don't have Prime.)

Thanks Jukeboxes, my daughter has fallen back on the old favourite of Sudocrem, and we are all telling the grandson the spots are going down ( which is being conservative with the truth) and he is happywith that.

My daughter popped into a supermarket this morning on the way to work, and I was wrong calomine is £1.99 bottle not £3! Bizzare behaviour.

Glad you got it sorted. (o; Fingers crossed the spots disappear soon (with no lasting marks!).

Welcome to Capitalism.

There was a new mum who needed baby formula a few weeks ago and apparently there was a shortage she found a supermarket with some and a couple in front cleared the whole shelf I think we will see more shortages and more scalping scumbags in the near future

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Originally Posted by higham5

So down in Birmingham helping out our daughter as no2 grandson has Chicken Pox. We decide to walk to the local pharmacy for a bottle of Calomine Lotion. Response, sorry sold out.
There follows 6 phone calls to “ pharmacies near me” all negative inc Tesco.

Amazon sold out, so I look on Ebay, first hit a bottle of Asda Calomine lotion £29.99. Thats not all some clown wants £99 for a 250 ml bottle. Im sure these bottles are £3 max ordinarily.

Reason …..Its the chicken pox season

There is entrepreneurship and there is taking the pizz.

Makes a Moonswatch at £600 look excellent value.

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I had both Chicken Pox and Hives as a child and my grandmother used to put a mixture of baking soda and corn flour on! it was a very watery mixture and worked a treat.

I think half the job is to cool the skin. The remainder is a gentle moisturiser. He seems happy enough, its my wife and I who are shattered and we have only been here 24 hours, he is such a live wire!

Steve

A bath with oats in. Our son had terrible pox, I think the Doctor suggested it.

I was behind someone at the pharmacy last week and the pharmacist, who had no stock, recommended original Head and Shoulders shampoo diluted in a cool bath.

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Originally Posted by phil h

A bath with oats in. Our son had terrible pox, I think the Doctor suggested it.

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Yes, we did this, porridge oats tied into a sock and dangled from the tap so it sits in the stream of water. Seem to remember it made the bath slippy, so watch out for that

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Originally Posted by Michael 38

There was a new mum who needed baby formula a few weeks ago and apparently there was a shortage she found a supermarket with some and a couple in front cleared the whole shelf I think we will see more shortages and more scalping scumbags in the near future

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When there are product shortages it's the shops duty to limit to a couple of items per person. In fact on pharmaceutical products I think that's par for the course in a lot of places, I witnessed a fella in our local tesco have a screaming match with one of the managers over his right to buy a full trolley of female sanitary products. He said they were to donate to charity, they said he was going to resell them in his shop and they (rightly) said he was taking the piss.

Your situation sucks but if there is a market to exploit, people will exploit it. There are no rules in place to stop reselling or retail arbitrage, so if someone is daft enough to pay 20 or 30 quid for a product worth a tenth that much then more fool them I'm sorry to say. There must be someone buying overpriced camomile lotion or there would be none listed on ebay.

It's a common thing, I've seen accounts on ebay who obviously make their living buying the hot/on trend "middle aisle" goodies from Aldi to flip. That's why I can never find stock on the rare occasions they have something cool.

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Originally Posted by Brighty

Yes, we did this, porridge oats tied into a sock and dangled from the tap so it sits in the stream of water. Seem to remember it made the bath slippy, so watch out for that

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My daughter did this last night apparently, made a big tea bag and used it to pat the areas.

Again thanks for all the suggestions