Michigan fabricator pivots to copper in COVID-19 era

Traverse City, Michigan-based Great Lakes Stainless, a maker of knobs, handles, support bars and counter surfaces, has introduced a copper line in a bid to provide anti-microbial surfaces to its customers.

The company, which says its customers include health care industry buyers of “procedure room cabinets in stainless, plastic laminate and solid surface materials,” has introduced a Copper Kills It red metals line of products. It is marketing the new product line in part on a newly created website.

Several studies conducted in different parts of the world in the past several decades have pointed to copper and brass as materials that repel or even destroy some viruses and microbes.

Great Lakes Stainless says its Copper Kills It products are “specifically engineered for maximum pathogen protection.” The firm adds, “We regularly fabricate products from copper, so when we went to address our company's highest touchpoints to kill coronavirus with the power of copper, we knew we had to share this with others.”

As property owners attempt to offer environments free of the COVID-19 coronavirus, the Michigan company says its “pure, uncoated copper” is ideal for “high-touch areas.”

Copper or copper-clad products available on the Great Lakes Stainless include door push plates, a door push bar and “crash bar” covers. The company says its products, which range from roughly $25 to $50, “are never coated and [are made] of the purest copper commercially available for maximum virus and germ-killing power.”