Coronavirus In Colorado: Denver Mattress Opens Floors To Make Face Masks

DENVER (CBS4) - A longtime Colorado company hopes it can help the state meet a few critical needs as it fights the spread of COVID-19. It starts with face masks, but could lead to production of another product that could be in demand.

In an uncertain time for businesses, the production floor at Denver Mattress Company has been relatively busy. In a major pivot, each machine and worker is focused on making face masks.

"Our goal today is to try to hit 3,000, and our end goal is to be able to get to a point where we're making 10,000 a day," said Matt Overmyer, Assistant GM of Manufacturing.

According to Overmyer, the company came up with the idea last week. After 15 prototypes, they landed on a 4-layer mask made completely of supplies already in house.

Soon, they'll send the first order of 40,000 to a local hospital.

"These are not for doctors or your front line people," Overmyer said. "These are for your general public to be able to come in so they have something, if they're not feeling well, to cover their face."

Eventually, the company could help with another expected problem - shortages in hospital beds at hospitals across the country.

Denver Mattress Co. currently has a prototype, made with hospital-grade fabric, ready for production.

Via Twitter, they recently offered up their services to New York governor, Andrew Cuomo.

"We've received multiple inquiries," Overmyer said. "We're just waiting on someone to tell us exactly the size, what kind of spec they need, and then once they get that done we can pump those out within days."

Until then, the company will keep making masks, only charging enough to cover costs. At this time about a quarter of employees are working, but the company could bring more back with increased demand for face masks, Overmyer said.

"This was just a simple way to figure out how we can do this to help, because the need is massive, and this is just at the heart of who we are," Overmyer said.

The company has the capability to make 1,500-1,800 hospital-grade mattresses per day. One of the last times it did something of that scale was following Hurricane Katrina.

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