White King maker Pental cleans up as coronavirus panic rules

White King bleach is in hot demand as panicked shoppers try to stay one step ahead of the coronavirus.

Charlie McLeish, CEO of White King maker Pental, in a Melbourne supermarket Picture: Stuart McEvoy

Such is the unprecedented demand for White King bleach by panicked shoppers trying to stay one step ahead of a possible coronavirus pandemic that a factory in central Victoria is pumping out 90,000 bottles a day of the cleaning agent, with its promise to kill 99.9 per cent of germs hooking anxious consumers.

Pental chief executive Charlie McLeish told The Australian on Thursday that the spike in demand for White King was triggered on Monday and has generated the company’s biggest sales rush ever, easily eclipsing Christmas or any other promotion it has staged for the supermarket brand in the past decade.

“This is busier than Christmas, bigger than any other day or week, bigger than any promotion we have done around spring cleaning,’’ he told The Australian.

As widespread panic buying hits a range of consumer staples, Woolworths chief executive Brad Banducci emailed the chain’s millions of Rewards loyalty program members on Thursday to tell them that, on top of restrictions on the sale of toilet paper, Woolworths would also introduce a limit of one package of large rice, 2kg and over, per transaction. Where available, hand sanitiser is now at the customer service desk and limited to two per transaction, Mr Banducci wrote.

But while Woolworths, Coles and other independent supermarkets are now rationing toilet paper, they are yet to place the same buying limits on bleach, with Pental’s White King factory not even housing its product in the warehouse but immediately shipping them out on fleets of trucks.

“We first noticed it yesterday. Our busiest days have been Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, with our warehouse completely stripped of White King product,’’ Mr McLeish told The Australian.

Speaking from a supermarket in Melbourne, where shelves were being restocked with White King as he walked the aisles, Mr McLeish said the sales took off after the weekend as news reports and social media focused on shoppers rushing supermarkets and scooping up essentials such as toilet paper, disinfectants and other personal hygiene products.

He said the White King factory was now running at full capacity, churning out about 90,000 bottles a day, to meet the unprecedented demand.

It was the same for the Sorbent factory, with that plant also running 24 hours a day and at full ­capacity as fears of the corona­virus turning into a pandemic frightened many consumers and led them to panic buy products.

Mr McLeish, whose Pental company also distributes Duracell batteries in Australia and has consumer brands such as Aim toothpaste and cleaning products like Country Life, Lux and Pears, said obtaining bleach for his factory was not a problem, but sourcing packaging was a concern amid the high demand.

“It is not so much the bleach itself, we don’t have a capacity problem but a demand problem, keeping up with demand, because of the shortage of raw materials and from our point of view the possible shortage is in the bottles and caps,” Mr McLeish said.

“We are fine with the liquid, it is the bottles and caps that could be a problem. Some of the packaging components come out of China.’’

Pental is also contacting all its raw suppliers as well as packaging suppliers to help out as it faces shortages on the shelf, and is working closely with transport providers to maximise freight ­operations.

“Demand has gone through the roof,” he said.

“The demand this week is higher than any promotional week, bigger than anything leading into Christmas, or any spring cleaning promotion. This is the biggest week we have ever had in bleach and I have been in this game for eight years.

“I think it is psychological, bleach kills 99.9 per cent of germs.’’

Pental is also pushing sales into Asia as the coronavirus outbreak boosts demand in China for its disinfectant and soaps range.