By Jacki Thrapp

NASHVILLE, Tenn.—Shoppers across America are clearing grocery store shelves ahead of this weekend’s winter blast.

Entire sections of the Whole Foods in downtown Nashville were empty on the evening of Jan. 22 as Music City residents braced for what the National Weather Service (NWS) warned could be a “catastrophic” ice storm.

“I didn’t expect shelves to be so bare,” one Whole Foods shopper who declined to provide their name for privacy reasons told the Epoch Times on Thursday.

“I always stock up on groceries after being stuck in Houston without power during that crazy ice storm in 2021. I didn’t take it too seriously back then but I learned my lesson. I definitely prepare now!”

The shopper was referring to the February 2021 storm that left millions of Texans without power for several days.

Social media users have flooded platforms showing videos of empty shelves and long lines at grocery stores.

Kroger’s social media team made a humorous Instagram video acknowledging the winter storm, asking, “Which winter storm shopper are you?” as the video showed one grocery cart full of wholesome items such as eggs, bread, and milk, and another cart being filled up with ice cream, hot cocoa mix, and cookies.

Publix set up generators at most of its stores and is prepared to “make round-the-clock product deliveries” to restock goods as long as it’s safe.

“In prep for weather events like this we have adjusted our production and truck delivery schedules for items we produce and manufacture, like water and milk to reflect the demand,” a spokesperson for Publix told The Epoch Times in a statement on Jan. 23.

The Epoch Times reached out to Kroger, Walmart, Whole Foods, Costco, and Albertsons for comment on how often food is restocked.

A map released by the National Weather Service on Jan. 23, 2026, shows winter weather advisories and warnings stretching from the southern Plains to the Northeast and South due to a pending winter storm. NWS

This round of winter weather is forecast to impact the eastern two-thirds of America.

“In the wake of this major winter storm, communities from the Southern Plains to the Northeast will contend with bitterly cold temperatures and dangerously cold wind chills,” the National Weather Service warned in an X post on Jan. 23.

Heavy snowfall is forecast from Oklahoma to the northeast, it said, with “widespread freezing rain and sleet” that’s expected across the Southern Plains, the Lower Mississippi Valley, the Tennessee Valley, and the Southeast.

“The storm will cause significant to locally catastrophic ice accumulations with the potential for long-duration power outages, extensive tree damage, and extremely dangerous or impassable travel conditions,” the NWS wrote in a separate post on X Friday.

A State of Emergency has been declared in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia, according to an Epoch Times review of the incoming storm.

The storm will be the first major weather event Virginia Gov. Abigail Spangerger, a Democrat, will face in her new position after being sworn in to office less than one week ago.

“Prepare your home, car, and family for multiple days of very low temperatures,” Spanberger warned in an X post on Jan. 23.