West Villages Improvement District: Modern times: toilet paper with that order?

Owner Darren Parent and employee Katelyn Bonatz stack toilet paper Thursday at the Zio’s Twelve 21 Pizzeria and Restaurant in North Port. Frustration with hoarders prompted the special deal.

PHOTO PROVIDED

https://www.yoursun.com/venice/modern-times-toilet-paper-with-that-order
by Craig Garrett Staff Writer, Marr 21, 2020

Breadsticks or a Mountain Dew? Sure.

But a roll of toilet paper?

Darren Parent figured why not? These are strange times. Less a gimmick than a real need under the cloud of coronavirus, Parent gave away rolls of toilet paper to customers Thursday at his Zio’s Twelve 21 Pizzeria and Restaurant in North Port.

The two-ply giveaway was more about frustration, he said, in a bind this week shopping for, among other things, rolls of TP. Stores were flushed clean by inflamed customers hoarding toilet paper, sanitizers and paper towels, he said.

“There were people in their pajamas … and all the (shopping) carts were gone within minutes,” he said. “It was crazy. Are you kidding me?

“And I came up with the idea … let’s doing something about this.”

So because Parent buys in bulk, he ordered a 96-roll box of toilet paper. Ten went home, the other 86 to those purchasing a large one-topping pizza, one per customer.

What would have been goofy even days ago, seemed like perfect sense Thursday, according to those on the Zio’s Twelve 21 Facebook page.

“Love love this,” a poster named Valerie Hinds Moody wrote.

And why not. Average Americans, according to toiletpaperhistory.net, use 100 rolls of toilet paper per year (over 20,000 sheets). The daily production of toilet paper is about 83 million rolls.

Until recently, facts like that were not brought up in polite circles. But COVID-19 has us bummed, hoarding, even trading blows. A meme in the coronavirus universe has card players using stacked toilet paper rolls rather than chips. And some local stores on Thursday had stockpiled TP behind the counter, singly giving it out like Tootsie Rolls to trick o’ treaters.

Parent and his assistant Katelyn Bonatz, a North Port High senior potentially missing graduation ceremonies due to class cancellations, stacked the green-wrapped rolls behind a glass partition, ready to reward takeout customers with the giveaway.

Ever think it would come to this, Parent was asked.

“Uh-uh,” he replied, smiling.

And then the first call at Zio’s came promptly at the 11 a.m. opening: One large pepperoni pizza with a roll of toilet paper, to go.

li H. Johnston, MBA in Real Estate