The Mission Regional Chamber of Commerce is asking local businesses what personal protective equipment they need most to be able to re-open.
The survey can be found on the chamber of commerce’s website under the COVID-19 resource link on the front page. The goal of the survey is to be able to connect the businesses to local suppliers, said Jo-Anne Chadwick, executive director of the chamber of commerce.
“[The survey is meant] to find out two things: What are people really struggling to find, and what businesses have the products they need?” Chadwick said. “We’ve called over 300 businesses to date, had one-on-one conversations with them, and the concerns have been, ‘How to I get my hands on PPE now? I don’t even know what I need to re-open safely.’ That’s where this idea came into play.”
Chadwick says the survey is just in its infancy and it’s list of local suppliers is going to be continually updated, but masks, face shields, gloves and hand sanitizer seem items that are hardest to find.
Businesses that Chadwick has connected to suppliers have been happy to find a local source for their PPE needs.
“Immediately we had people contact us and say, ‘We have masks, we have shields and we have this,’” she said. “Because why not support locally rather than order from Amazon, or you know, any large, nameless, faceless organization?”
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