I have been very surprised to hear that supply lists are not made available to parents until last minute. Another surprising aspect (at least to me) is that it sounds like the lists can vary from teacher to teacher. Several years ago in my school district, the superintendent mandated that all elementary school buildings have the same supply list for each grade level. Our school supply list has remained unchanged since then.
Also, all parents are given a copy of the supply list with their registration materials for the upcoming year in May. I can't imagine giving a parent a list on the first day of school and expecting them to scramble all around that night to find the supplies.

In fact, most of the large stores around here (e.g. Target, Wal-Mart, K-Mart) have copies of all the surrounding school supply lists in their Back-to-School sections!