Glove rush continues: American Nitrile latest to plan NBR gloves production

COLUMBUS, Ohio—Recently formed American Nitrile L.L.C. has seen its path clear to complete development of a nitrile glove manufacturing plant in nearby Grove City, Ohio.

Founded by Jacob Block, CEO of the company, in January 2021, the firm recently entered a strategic agreement with Orion Infrastructure Capital under which Orion will provide $105 million in debt financing needed to add production lines and complete remaining work on supporting infrastructure at the refurbished 530,000-sq.-ft. factory.

American Nitrile began work on the plant, a former warehouse, last August and expects to complete the project and begin manufacturing nitrile gloves this July, the 29-year old Block said.

He added that the site will operate 12 high-speed production lines at the plant with a capacity to produce 3.6 billion medical and non-medical groves per year when the facility is fully operational.

About six production lines will be operating this year and another six will come on line in 2023.

Approximately 400 employees are expected to be hired at the factory when it's at full capacity, he said, adding that medical and non-medical latex-free gloves manufactured at the Grove City plant will be earmarked primarily for the health care, government and industrial sectors.

Block launched the business during the COVID pandemic because there was a shortage of personal protective equipment—especially in the medical sector—produced in the U.S.

"When we started looking at PPE products made in the U.S. that we could produce beyond the pandemic, we looked at masks, gowns and gloves, with gloves being the most difficult to manufacture," Block said. "We chose gloves, even though they are the tougher products to manufacture."

He noted that the determining factors were barriers to entering the U.S. by offshore companies, automation and cost parity.

Most gloves are made in Malaysia and other countries in the Asia-Pacific region. In addition to production shortages, many imports have been halted due to suspicion of forced labor practices, the company said in a news release.

In October, the U.S. banned entry of Supermax gloves over alleged forced labor violations. In September, Top Glove was allowed to resume exporting and selling gloves to the U.S. after gloves were seized at the border in March 2021 for the same reason.

Block noted that American Nitrile's management team has decades of experience in nitrile production and heavy manufacturing. "We chose PPE production in part because of the glaring weakness in the supply chain exposed by the pandemic," he said. "This (the Grove City plant) is our first building and the only one we currently operate."

However, the firm has been pre-selling orders for its latex-free gloves for the last year and has built up a solid order base, he said.

American Nitrile began working with the major manufacturers of nitrile butadiene latex in Italy, South Korea and the United Kingdom, and set up a supply base for its products.

It partnered with Orion—a capital investment firm founded in 2015 and headquartered in New York and Houston with $2.8 billion in assets under management—for the additional funding needed to complete work on the Grove City plant and establish the start-up of production in July.

Block noted that the Grove City production plant will leverage best-in-class manufacturing processes and automation to reduce the impact of higher labor costs and replace gloves sourced from Asia.

American Nitrile's factory will include a state-of-the-art water treatment and reclamation system that recycles 50 percent of the wastewater generated by the manufacturing system, he said. That, along with the elimination of emissions caused by trans-Pacific shipping, will create a reduced carbon footprint for gloves made by American Nitrile, he added.

In the 1990s, a good deal of the nitrile glove manufacturing was by companies in the U.S., but manufacturers moved production offshore to Malaysia and other Asian countries as the decade ended.

"We believe that American manufacturing deserves a comeback," Block said. "Orion's investment is a nod of confidence in the long-term viability and growth of our business that will allow us to manufacture an increasingly in-demand product here in America's heartland—and we're going to be able to do it sustainably and competitively."

Ethan Shoemaker, investment partner and head of Infra Credit at Orion, said his company is excited to join with American Nitrile, "a pioneer in onshoring U.S. nitrile glove manufacturing. This facility will establish a stable supply of competitively priced, domestically produced PPE that employs the most efficient manufacturing processes available.

"This partnership supports Orion's goal to champion sustainable infrastructure through strategic investment partnerships."