Jacksonville business owner selling hand sanitizer to help food banks, first responders

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Zachary Penn, owner of Deep Water Koi Innovations, has noticed the impact of the hand sanitizer shortage during the pandemic, he told Action News Jax Tuesday.

He described, “I just couldn’t get hand sanitizer, mask, things like that. If I could find it was very expensive and had to pay for shipping.”

In March, Action News Jax showed you empty shelves inside grocery stores.

According to Penn, by purchasing liquid hand sanitizer in bulk and bottling it on his own, he’s able to help food banks and first responders.

“Donate a bottle of hand sanitizer to first responders for every nine that are purchased, and then all the profits from each bottle sales goes to the local food banks,” Penn said.

Between the jugs, the hand sanitizer and other supplies the business owner claimed he has $12,000 invested in ‘Helping Handsanitizer.’

The gallon bottles – each with logo hand-drawn by Penn’s niece – cost $50 each.

Penn said he’s donated 8 jugs to Church of Our Saviour, another 6 to Pasco Fire and Rescue, and scheduled volunteers to speed up the packaging.

“We’re going to have COVID on top of regular cold and flu. I foresee this going at least probably another year that we’re going to have to be careful out in public,” Penn said.

Information on ordering, picking up hand sanitizer is posted on Facebook:

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