By Heather Haddon and Jaewon Kang

Power outages and supply problems tied to the frigid weather in Texas and surrounding states are constraining operations at restaurants and supermarkets throughout the region and with auto makers' nationwide.

Some residents say they have waited in long lines at grocery stores and gas stations. Bottled water is hard to find and frozen food at some stores without power has spoiled. Over 400,000 customers in Texas still had no power and millions of residents were under a boil-water notice on Thursday as another winter storm pounded covered much of the U.S. with snow, freezing rain and extreme cold.

H-E-B LP, a Texas supermarket chain, said it has shortened store hours and cut back on nonessential power usage, such as for lighting. The company placed purchase limits on some items, including water and propane tanks. Aldi Inc., another grocery chain, said Thursday that it reopened a Texas distribution center closed earlier in the week as snow and frigid temperatures descended across the southern U.S.

Meanwhile, General Motors Co. and Ford Motor Co. each said they were cutting output at U.S. factories that produce some of their most profitable vehicles.

GM canceled work shifts in Arlington, Texas, where it makes big SUVs, and at its Silao, Mexico, factory, which produces Chevrolet and GMC pickups. Those vehicles already are in short supply and are GM's biggest moneymakers. Production also has been disrupted at GM factories in Tennessee and Kentucky.

Ford canceled at least one work shift at its pickup-truck factories in suburban Detroit, where it makes the F-150 pickup, and in Louisville, Ky., where it manufactures the Super Duty pickup. Ford's other F-150 factory, outside of Kansas City, Mo., has been idled all week to save natural gas used to heat homes and is expected to resume operations Monday.

Ford's Mustang plant near Detroit and a factory in Hermosillo, Mexico, also canceled shifts Thursday.

Many restaurants in the Texas region had stocked up for Valentine's Day and Fat Tuesday, only to see reservations vanish as temperatures plummeted. Reservations at Texas restaurants this week were at the lowest levels since last May, according to online booking site OpenTable.

Jack Gilmore said he closed the six Austin restaurants he co-owns on Saturday night due to the coming storm. He said that Valentine's Day is typically his third-busiest night of the year; his Jack Allen's Kitchen and Salt Traders Coastal Cooking restaurants were stocked with enough food for days of strong sales. He said some employees have asked if they can take milk home from restaurant coolers because they can't find it at grocery stores.

Mr. Gilmore estimated he has lost hundreds of thousands of dollars in sales from the storms. Reopening will take more than restoring power because suppliers to his farm-to-table restaurants have been hurt by the cold weather, too, he said. Seafood supplies have been disrupted, he said, and the storm wiped out the state's citrus crop during its growing season.

"It's going to be a lot easier to unlock the door than getting product in," he said.

Jason Morgan, owner of Texas-based chains bellagreen and Original ChopShop, said produce, beef, chicken and shrimp spoiled at some of his 22 restaurants while they remained closed for much of this week. He said he worries that insurance won't cover losses related to the bad weather if his stores weren't physically damaged.

"It doesn't matter if streets are impassable and employees can't get to work," he said.

The Texas Restaurant Association is connecting restaurants holding surplus food with hospitals in need, said Anna Tauzin, the trade group's chief revenue and innovation officer. Distributors including Houston-based Sysco Corp., US Foods Holding Corp. and Gordon Food Services Inc. said they were focusing on deliveries to hospitals over restaurants.

Jagtar Nijjar, Gordon's director of imports and commodities, said the Wyoming, Mich.-based distributor was also rerouting products bound for Texas to other regions because of road closures. He said many of the company's drivers in the area aren't used to icy highways and frigid temperatures, and that some trucks became stranded.

"It's going to take the weather turnaround before we see things get back to normal," he said.

Production has also been disrupted at some poultry plants in the region where Gordon picks up meat, said Mr. Nijjar. Meat companies including Pilgrim's Pride Corp. said this week they had temporarily suspended some operations.

--Mike Colias contributed to this article.

Write to Heather Haddon at heather.haddon@wsj.com and Jaewon Kang at jaewon.kang@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

02-18-21 1806ET