People in the path of a hurricane don’t always follow official advice to stock up on bottled water, according to new research.
The working paper explores bottled water sales before, during, and after hurricanes. Public policy professor Jay Shimshack of University of Virginia’s Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy, and colleagues focused on bottled water because sales data is readily available, and local, state, and federal guidelines state that bottled water is an essential emergency preparedness commodity.
Early results show that bottled water sales increase modestly, around 5 to 15 percent, in coastal areas as hurricanes approach. The researchers found sharper increases, up to 135 percent, in bottled water sales across affected communities after hurricane landfalls. Communities most likely to prepare ahead of time saw much smaller increases in sales after storms made landfall.
