Perry Olivier has been busy doing deliveries.
But it's not cars, it's PPE.
The sales manager at Stockfish Ford Sales on Highway 17 East, visited four area long-term care homes to hand out 200 personal protective equipment masks for frontline workers in the local facilities.
"Ford Motor Company reached out to the dealers about two or three weeks ago and they were going to be switching production to make these face shields and they were going to produce about 2.5 million by the end of May," said Olivier.
"Part of the distribution was that they were going to give about 100,000 of these shields to dealers across Canada for them to distribute throughout their communities. We have decided to help out some of the long term care facilities around the city."
On Wednesday Olivier was busy dropping off PPE to long term care homes including Cassellholme, Water's Edge, Nipissing Manor, and Eastholme in Powassan. Delivery to Algonquin Nursing Home in Mattawa was done on Tuesday.
"We have handed out 200 shields today," he said.
"We have put on a few kilometres delivering them. Ford of Canada is producing these for frontline health care workers and first responders. It is only a little thing we can do for them because they are the ones that are fighting it every day."
And the feedback has made the deliveries very rewarding.
"I personally did the deliveries to four of the places and the response was overwhelming," said Olivier, who has worked at Stockfish Ford for 25 years.
"Everybody was so thankful and they came out and thanked us. The appreciation was crazy, it was over the top. It was kind of nice to see."
Olivier credits dealership owner Mike Stockfish for coordinating the efforts. He says they request any of the facilities that do not need the face shields to return them to Stockfish Ford and they will try to distribute to other frontline workers in the community.
