Jim Hourigan, CEO of Care By Design’s parent company CannaCraft, said “when we started hearing reports of a shortage in hand sanitizer, we knew that we could be of assistance without negatively impacting our employees or our operations.”
CannaCraft founder Dennis Hunter told Leafly that ingredients and packaging once used to make cannabis extracts and skin creams are now keeping cops and nurses safe at work.
Earlier this month CannaCraft called upon three staff chemists to compound ethanol and other medical-grade alcohol with 55-gallon drums of aloe vera—both of which CannaCraft had at the plant. Their on-site lab verified the compound’s strength against SARS-CoV-2, according to FDA guidance documents. CannaCraft then repurposed unused topicals packaging, industrial bottle-filling machines, and label makers to mass-produce the needed supplies.
CannaCraft had planned to release the initial 40-gallon, 5,000-tube run of hand sanitizer to cannabis stores and delivery services. But a local newspaper story drew the attention of nearby nurses and cops. On March 26, CannaCraft loaded cases of Care By Design hand sanitizer into a Santa Rosa Police Department patrol vehicle.