Lesson learnt from previous MCO, pet owners stock up on supplies

MELAKA: Besides shopping for the everyday necessities to prepare for the lockdown, pet owners are also stocking up on the essential pet supplies.

A check by Bernama at several pet shops here found bare or fairly empty shelves as most of the pet food, litter and several other products had sold out.

A customer, Razak Arshad, 30, said as he had a terrible experience during the Movement Control Order (MCO) 1.0 after running out of several necessities for his two cats, five goldfish and a rabbit, he is more prepared this time around.

"Previously (during MCO 1.0) my gold fish died because I ran out of their food supply and could not buy the tank filters because the shops were closed and after switching to another brand of cat food, my cats had diarrhea.

"Maybe to others it is normal, but seeing my pets die because I could not feed them had affected me greatly. I don't want this to happen again so I have bought more than the usual amount," he said.

Meanwhile pet shop employee Hana Rashid, 25, said the shop owner has made the necessary preparations to ensure there is adequate supply of stocks for customers.

"For now we have sufficient stock but we cannot guarantee there will be additional supplies coming in as we are not sure if the suppliers will be able to deliver goods during the lockdown.

"As for the shop operation, we are prepared to deal with customers only at the front entrance as practiced earlier," she said adding that customers could always opt for online shopping.

Though customers had been lining up at the shop front since early this morning, Hana said there was no congestion, as customers were attended to speedily to reduce the queue.

-- BERNAMA