El Paso distributor can’t fulfill disinfectant orders due to supply disruption during pandemic
EL PASO, Texas -- A local distributor, who has been apart of the El Paso community since 1920 says this pandemic has disrupted the supply chain unlike anything they’ve seen before.
Southwestern Mill Distributor Incorporated stretches back four generations. The fourth generation and general manager, Sean Sterling, explained: “We buy in bulk and redistribute. We distribute janitorial supplies, paper products, we sell to government entities, school district and we also do small business with restaurants.”
Sterling said they have never faced this kind of supply chain challenge in its 100 plus years of business. Disinfectant spray, disinfectant wipes and gloves for sure are the three hardest things to get right now,” he said. In March a majority of one of their warehouses, which store toilet paper was almost empty. “Everyone had almost bought every roll that we had,” he said. He would follow up in text message saying: “WW2, people would fight over toilet paper because it was scarce. There have been plenty of paper strikes and paper shortages but nothing to this extent.”
The family business said they demand is constantly high, however the supply is severely low due to manufactures. “Now the problem is a lot of the manufacturers are telling us that instead of a thousand cases that you ordered you are going to get two hundred in two months and the price has gone up 15 to 20 percent,” Sterling said.
ABC-7 asked if the demand had changed since Covid-19 had hit the states.
“The demand is just so much you are looking at a 300 to 500 percent increase in demand for the big items: gloves, disinfectant sprays, disinfectant wipes because they are easy to use. They can’t make it fast enough. They don’t have enough product available. That’s the issues. It’s not just local, it’s nationwide and global. Its a global pandemic,” he said..
Southwestern Mill Distributor Incorporated said they do business with the El Paso, Ysleta and Socorro indepdendent school districts. ABC-7 reached out to each district for comment to see if this was affecting any of them.
EPISD said they stocked up on sanitized goods and received PPE from the state, so this delay from one of their distributors does not cause a disruption.
YISD said they have sufficient inventory of disinfectant, hand sanitizer, cloth masks, face shields and PPE. They say they have various suppliers, so this delay does not disrupt them either.
Socorro ISD did not respond.
