Local Lake Macquarie company Sirron Group has made the shift from producing commercial dishwashers and cleaning products to hand sanitiser, during the Covid-19 pandemic.
With increasing stress on the hospitality industry due to isolation restrictions, the company had to rapidly adapt to continue operating.
"We were watching what was happening to hospitality in other parts of the world and it would mean our revenue would stop when the virus impacted Australia," said Sirron Managing Director Greg Gates.
The company noticed the critical shortage of - and growing need for- health supplies and made the decision to stop creating dishwashers to produce hand sanitiser instead.
"We had a small mixing and filling plant for the production of chemicals for cleaning products and it was evident that if we didn't change to create something that was going to help, we were in trouble," said Greg Gates.
Sirron’s 30 staff members, many of whom are trained in welding and other trades, have shifted their focus to producing hand sanitiser, saving their jobs in the process.
The Caves Beach facility is now operating 20 hours a day, churning out about 1500 litres of hand sanitiser every hour, however, demand still far outstrips supply and the company has had to put on an extra seven staff members to cope with the high demand for the product.
"More people are using hand sanitiser than ever before... We have focused on local households and business first in the Hunter, and are shipping across Australia everyday...The team really gets that they are making a difference," said Greg Gates.
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| A Sirron worker filling and labeling hand sanitiser bottles. |
