A MOUNT Gambier business is working around the clock to fulfil soaring orders fuelled by the coronavirus pandemic.
While hundreds of businesses are at a standstill across the region, innovative workwear supplier Badger has ramped up production to supply a staggering 63,000 safety vests for a national supermarket.
The vests – which will be worn by staff to promote social distancing – are being shipped out to stores across Australia in the fight against the spread of COVID-19.
The order is so significant a logistics company cannot airfreight the product by plane and has instead placed additional trucks on the road.
The company has also secured an order for thousands of face masks, which are being made via a sub-contractor in Mount Gambier.
Badger director Ben Cox revealed the company had employed additional staff and implemented two shifts to meet the eight-day order deadline.
He said the contract was secured through the business’ established network, which was a coup for a regional area.
“We were one of several in the tender process. We had the inquiry last Wednesday morning, we put the job in that night and we had approval about 10am Thursday,” Mr Cox said at the Calula Drive production site yesterday.
He said staff had been busily branding the logo on the safety vests since Saturday, along with a sub-contractor based in Sydney.
“We sourced the vests from several suppliers and have sent around half of the vests to Sydney. We will do around 40,000 in Mount Gambier,” Mr Cox said.
“We are looking at pushing out 4000 to 5000 vests per day.”
Mr Cox said he was thrilled he could put on additional casual staff to boost his nine-person team for the order.
“It is great we can do the order here in Mount Gambier,” Mr Cox said, explaining the order was also stimulating the region’s distribution network.
But he said it was not an easy task given the short timeframe set by the customer.
“The product (vests) was delayed coming from Melbourne, so we decided to hire a truck from AVIS and it left Saturday morning picked up some pallet loads and came back,” Mr Cox said.
“With the rate we are going, we are hopeful to be close to having the order completed by Thursday night, which is a seven-day turnaround.”
The company also had to quickly establish a production room to increase production flow.
Mr Cox said the business was – at this stage – escaping a significant fallout from COVID-19 given it supplied products to the food industry.
“But none of us can be too sure, so we always have to plan for what is around the corner,” he said.
“We have had fairly strong sales right through for products, particularly in the specialised clothing for the cold storage industry such as gloves, head-wear and jackets.”
The company imports products from around the world.
“This product is shipped into Melbourne and trucked to Mount Gambier. We take the orders from the customer and it goes back out again,” Mr Cox said.
Limestone Coast Regional Development Australia chair Peter Gandolfi said it was pleasing some businesses and industries were pushing through the coronavirus economic meltdown.
He said the fall-out of the COVID-19 had triggered a tragic outcome for many businesses “through no fault of their own”.
“But there are some businesses that are maintaining the same level of business activity before this health pandemic,” Mr Gandolfi said.
He said the obvious industry continuing to thrive during the health crisis was tissue manufacturing.
“But this will flatten out in the near future when people stop hoarding toilet tissue.”
