It's a clay issue...

So I've been having a bit of a clay issue these days. Basically, my clay distributor went out of business and I can no longer get the clay I have been using for the past 5 years unless I want to drive across the boarder down to Seattle and pick it up myself. I don't feel that's the best use of my time these days, so instead I am clay shopping but am starting to think that it's a big waste of my time and money... am I right?
I have been working in clay for 16 years now and know that the minute you change the clay body even slightly -not to speak of temperature, just clay body and brand, EVERYTHING changes.
Here's for the techy types- hang in there if you don't mind a little shop talk...
I went from using 'Georgies Pink Salmon Cone 4-7' to try #1- 'Laguna B-Mix Cone 5-6'- pretty standard well-used white (although now that I've fired it I'd say yellow) clay body that I used before the Georgies. Well, it seem that B-mix doesn't like being fired to Cone 6 as one of my large bowls in the middle of the kiln bubbled and the clay turned very yellow making my lovely pale blue glaze more on the green side than the blue. Hmmm. Not going to work for me. So I am onto a more local Canadian clay- Plainsman but Porcelain (P300). I generally steer clear of a pure porcelain because it's like throwing with cream cheese and I end up throwing it too thick and having to trim too much off. Anyways, I had to make a trip out to the only other clay supplier in the Greater Vancouver area today and committed to 6 boxes of the stuff so I'll be darned if it doesn't work for me. In the meantime it has got me thinking... what would happen if more of these companies and suppliers go under considering the current economy?