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PANDEMIC RESPONSE BY BRIAN HARTZ | TAMPA BAY EDITOR Switch It Up
Manufacturers across the region are responding to the coronavirus crisis in a multitude of ways, with innovation and generosity at the forefront.
The Defense Production Act can compel U.S. companies to use their facilities and resources to make medical and other supplies needed to combat the coronavirus pandemic. But on the west coast of Florida, manufacturers and other entities, proving the axiom that the private sector often does things faster than the government, are taking it upon themselves to pitch in.
Breweries and distilleries are switching from booze to hand sanitizer. A handbag manufacturer is churning out protective face masks. A shower door and glass company is offering to make protective glass enclosures that retailers could use at checkouts.
Others, of course, like Micro Matic in Brooksville, a maker and distributor of parts for bar and restaurant beer-dispensing systems, are just trying to figure out how to keep their doors open and paychecks in the hands of workers.
“It’s challenging for everybody,” Micro Matic President Cian Hickey says. Given the nature of its business, Hickey thinks it’s unlikely that Micro Matic will repurpose its manufacturing capabilities to produce medical supplies. But he doesn’t rule anything out and says that the firm could produce “stainless steel face masks” if needed.
“We don’t necessarily have the same synergies and flexibility” as other manufacturers, Hickey adds, but says he “absolutely” views keeping workers employed as a way Micro Matic can do its part to stem the tide of economic woe. “Our commitment is to try to limp through this and make sure we don’t impact any of our full-time staff.”
In Fort Myers, meanwhile, Bill Daubmann, president of My Shower Door/D3 Glass, a $17.8 million company with clients nationwide, is ready to launch production of custom-made glass health guards. The health guards can be installed in register aisles, at cashier counters and in food areas. Office spaces can also be fabricated with large glass panels, says Daubmann, whose firm opened an BILL DAUBMANN, with My Shower Door/3D Glass, says the Fort Myers company is ready to make protective glass shields.
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$8 million, 60,000-square-foot headquarters and manufacturing facility off Alico Road in Fort Myers last year.
“We have the capabilities to do a lot of things with flat glass,” says Daubmann, a Business Observer Top Entrepreneur in 2019 who has sat in on some Lee County conference calls connecting hospitals and other entities with companies that can help supply products. “We are putting it out there that we have a solution. We will work with anyone who has a need.”
SANITATION ENGINEERS Thankfully, so far, there hasn’t been a run on glass like there is with toilet paper. Hand sanitizer, too, has been nearly impossible to find on store shelves in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Hospitals and nursing homes are in constant need of hand sanitizer too. Sensing an opportunity, Gulf Coast beer and liquor makers have sprung into action.
In Clearwater, Big Storm Brewing has applied for a federal distillation license that, if granted, will allow it to produce between 50 and 100 gallons of ethanol per day that will be packaged and sold to government agencies, hospitals, medical offices, first responders and other organizations in desperate need of the product. In the meantime, the brewery has already been pumping out a liquid-based hand sanitizer spray that’s being made in accordance with World Health Organization standards.
Big Storm co-owner L.J. Govoni says the U.S. Tax and Trade Bureau has been working overtime to speed up the application process for companies like his that want to repurpose their manufacturing capabilities.
“They’ve really cut the time dow n,” he says. “They’ve
COURTESY Sarasota-based handbag manufacturer BSwanky is making face masks for two nonprofit senior communities.
