We’re all looking for things to do while we’re under various states of lockdown and social distancing. You might be taking the opportunity to knock away at a few model projects, tackling a backlog of things to build and paint. Well, the people behind those models and paints are also looking for things to do—and doing so in style.
Last week, the Army Painter—independent hobby supply makers who’ve been providing washes, sprays, paints, and modeling accessories since 2007—announced that since it was not currently using its manufacturing facilities to create new stock of its paint supplies, the machines had been put to a new use. Following WHO guidelines and after a thorough sterilization of its (presumably paint-covered) machinery, the company’s warpaint bottles would now be filled with hand sanitizer.
At first, the supply made by the Army Painter will be donated to local schools in its native Denmark for free, so that when they re-open and social distancing measures are slowly lifted, children and teachers will have access to appropriate hygiene tools. From there, the company is working on supplying the sanitizer through its international distribution options, meaning that you might eventually be able to pick up a bottle or two yourself alongside some Nolzur’s Marvelous Pigments.
Last Thursday, Army Painter co-founder Bo Penstoft even took to Twitter to show wargamers the first familiar (yet now very different) bottles containing sanitizer to roll off the production line as a manufacturing test.
It’s not just Army Painter in the hobby space who are using the opportunity (and their manufacturing gear) to help people keep hygenic during the coronavirus pandemic. When Games Workshop—the company behind tabletop staples Warhammer 40K and Warhammer—announced a shutdown of its retail and online operations at the end of March, it also took to Twitter to confirm that the company that produces its Citadel line of paints and glues had also turned to developing and providing hand sanitizer production for the UK’s National Health Service.
So you might not be able to get your hands on some new paints to get cracking on that backlog of grey plastic taunting you from afar. But at least there’s a noble reason for that right now.
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