Renewable Revolution

The Hand Sanitizer You Can't Find Is In This Putz's Garage
Online retailers have stopped gouging. Now what?[/b]



By Jordan HoffmanMarch 14, 2020
During troubling times it is psychologically helpful to know where to vent your anger. After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, we had the face of Osama bin Laden. With the Coronavirus, there really isn’t anyone specific to blame, and it’s hard to make a dartboard out of a blown-up photo of an infected cytoplasm. The current pandemic isn’t one specific person’s fault, but there are individuals who have found in this global panic a route to becoming a real jerk.

Chief among them is Tennessee’s Matt Colvin who, with the aid of his brother Noah, was inspired by news of the potential for over 1 million American deaths to turn a handsome profit.

The retired Air Force technical sergeant is the new face of price gouging, thanks to a profile in Saturday’s New York Times. Beginning March 1st, Colvin, whose primary income is reselling collected goods on sites like Amazon, hit the road and bought as much hand sanitizer as he could find. For a while, the money was rolling in. But when his prices soared, Amazon, eBay and other marketplaces rightly shut him and his fellow panic profiteers down. He estimates he now has 17,700 bottles of the virus-killing ooze, as well as hand wipes and all the other highly sought after materials you can’t find in a store right now. The cleaning products are collecting dust.

The Times suggests that Colvin is just one of thousands of resellers that gobbled up prevention goods with an eye toward making a small fortune. (But he’s the one they photographed in a t-shirt that says “Family Man Family Business” in front of shelves of Purel and Clorox wipes he can not sell.) Chris Anderson of Central Pennsylvania estimates he made about $25,000 on masks, similar to the ones that hospitals are now rationing. An Ohio-based online seller by the name of Eric says he has made between $35,000 and $40,000 on masks. He declined to give his last name, not out of shame, but fearing “a retaliation from Amazon.”

On the one hand, you wonder if you can really blame these men? Buying low and selling high is an American tradition with roots as deep as the buttonwood tree where a group of traders created the New York Stock Exchange in 1792. Then you read Matt Colvin, hoarder of hand sanitizer, suggesting that price-gouging laws “are not built for today’s day and age. They’re built for Billy Bob’s gas station doubling the amount he charges for gas during a hurricane.” As if Coronavirus isn’t the world’s biggest hurricane.

As it happens, making your own hand sanitizer isn’t impossible. My wife cooked up a huge batch made of aloe vera gel, rubbing alcohol and some essential oils. (And I am proud to report we are not selling it online at inflated prices.) Additionally, all signs point to soap and water being an effective, if not the most effective, weapon against viruses.