What to do in a shortage?

We have now been in this business for quite a long time. Even though the work is hard and can be stressful, that's not the most stressful part. The most stressful part is when we have to manage a shortage of milk or eggs. Our desire is to make everyone happy and provide you with a source for the products you want and need for your family. However, exactly matching supply and demand is a nearly impossible task. Sometimes it works, and that's great. Sometimes we have a surplus, and nobody complains about that. Sometimes, though, the cycles of our natural production methods line up such that we have a temporary shortage. That is a problem. Recurring orders, which are normally a good thing, exacerbate the problem of a supply shortage. In the past, we have left the recurring orders active during the shortage and tried to fill those orders. Honestly, this never really felt fair. I can't say that someone with a recurring milk order is more important than someone who physically logs onto our site and orders milk for that week. You can probably tell that it bothers me when I can't fill every order and make everyone happy. I have wrestled with this decision for a while. After a lot of thought, I believe the fairest way to handle these situations is as follows: -Allow unlimited recurring orders as long as production is adequate. -During a shortage -Temporarily suspend recurring for the short products. -Publish to all customers when the inventory will go live for the following week. -Post to inventory our best educated prediction of available product for that week. Only allow that number to be ordered for that week. -If the shortage is severe, limit the quantity per order. Please understand that this is not something that we ever want to do. We will strive to always produce abundantly. Even though natural cycles and small-scale farming can't provide quite the consistency of a grocery store, we will do our very best. Notice: This week's recurring orders are still active, as I didn't want to spring this on anybody without an explanation. If the shortage continues into next week, we may need to suspend the recurring functionality temporarily. If that's necessary, we will communicate accordingly.