Local facility cranking out TP as quickly as possible

A nationwide run on toilet paper, fueled by fears the COVID-19 pandemic will lead to weeks of home confinement, has led to empty store shelves across America, including here in the Cape Girardeau area.

"We're selling it as quickly as we can get it in," said the manager of one Cape Girardeau grocery store where it wasn't unusual last week for a shipment of toilet paper to sell out within minutes. At another store, signs above empty shelves told shoppers there was a limit of one package of toilet paper per customer.

Meanwhile, toilet paper production is in "overdrive" a few miles away at one of the world's largest paper product manufacturing facilities.

The coronavirus outbreak has led to high demand for toilet paper and paper towels "in record amounts across our whole system," said Jack Geissinger, manager of the Family Care Division at the Procter & Gamble plant north of Cape Girardeau. "Both Bounty and Charmin brands are seeing increased sales as people keep focusing on personal hygiene."

Paper towels, he said, are in high demand because people are using them to clean household counters and other surfaces.

As for consumer demand for toilet paper, Geissinger said its "hard to project" how long the excess demand will roll on.

"At some point people's pantries are going to be full," he said.

"This would normally be an average month (for toilet paper sales), but it's certainly higher than it's been in a number of years so we're putting everything into overdrive," Geissinger added and said production lines are running 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and the company is doing its best to equitably distribute Charmin and Bounty products to grocery stores and other retail outlets.

"We're working with our customers and retailers so they can all have something rather than one or two taking most of it," he said. "Everybody's getting something. They're not all getting what they want, but we're giving them more than we ever have."

Although the plant is running at or near full capacity, Geissinger said keeping up with the short-term demand is not always possible.

"The reality is we cannot meet all of the demand now," he said. "We'll catch up (but for now) we are working with retailers to make sure we share what we're producing and that's a key thing."

P&G has more than 500 employees in its Family Care Division here and about the same number in the plant's Baby Care Division, which makes Pampers brand diapers and other baby care products. "Baby Care is also seeing a surge in orders," Geissinger said.

All told, the P&G plant has more than 1,100 employees plus a few hundred contractors, all of whom, Geissinger said, are mindful of the measures recommended by health authorities to help control the spread of the COVID-19 virus such as additional hand washing, social distancing and staying home when necessary.

"The safety of our employees and their health is most critical to us and we're doing a lot of workarounds just to make sure they're safe while making our products," he said. "We're adapting."

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