Honestly, I think the problem is more nuanced than just the vendor dropping out of comms, etc.
First, I catch myself getting impatient too often because I forget the levels of risk they take on just providing the service. You know what I mean -- "Your mag dealer is not Amazon.com"
Imagine you are a vendor that cares about your business and your clients. Something happens that really sets you back and you're holding $25k in orders that you now can't make because <insert one of a dozen possible reasons here>. You have around 50 open orders and now you're getting a new email every 10 minutes as people start to panic. You have a possible idea of when you can start mailing mags but again, it is dependent on a few things out of your control.
What I often forget is that I'm just one out of dozens or even up to a hundred clients trying to get info on their order. Things can spiral out of control very quickly because this isn't a large business -- it is just one guy (or woman) trying to keep on top of things but drowning in user requests.
So yeah, I think it becomes a comms issue where the vendor should be upfront and make announcements to a global audience -- but now you are severely restricted on exactly what you can say or explain to everyone.