Outdoor Research makes masks to help with COVID-19 fight

SEATTLE — Seattle company Outdoor Research, known for making outdoor, tactical and military apparel, is switching gears to help fight COVID-19 and address the shortage of personal protective equipment for frontline health care workers.

Outdoor Research, located in the Sodo neighborhood, is committed to making 200,000 masks a day.

“With Seattle being the epicenter, we felt like we could do a lot more in the things we're doing. We're trying to look at the community. Who's in the most need? And it seemed be in our backyard,” said Jason Duncan, the company’s Head of Tactical, Innovation, and CSR.

Outdoor Research is also a contractor for tactical and military gear for the Department of Defense.

Before the Governor's ffice reached out to them, the staff was already trying to figure out how to help.

“Knowing our skills and our experience and our capacity, we had this, 'Let's start making masks'” idea,” explained Brent Zwiers, the company’s director of operations and production.

Now, the third floor of their building off 1st Avenue South is being converted to a mask-making factory. The company is on the path to getting Food and Drug Administration approval and waiting on special automated equipment. By late April, the company expects to make ASTM level 3 surgical masks, ramping up to 140,000 masks a day at full capacity. By May or June, workers will also be making N95 respirator masks -- up to 50,000 a day.

“In the immediate time frame, we are going to use the resources we have here to cut and sew handmade masks. That is going to start next week,” Zwiers said.

Outdoor Research said it employs about 100 factory workers in the area -- all ready to get to work.

“We want to pivot in our skill set. Our workers are capable, highly capable of building stuff and we really want to help our front line medical staff,” said Feng He, senior production manager.

Outdoor Research said it is ramping up slowly to ensure health and safety protocols are in place. That includes daily temperature checks.

The company has not had to lay off any workers and will be adding about 100 people as they ramp up production.

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