Front Line Buttons

#frontlinebuttons

Why Buttons?

In early April I was trying to source material so I could put my CNC laser to work while things were slow. I wanted to help and it made absolutely no sense to have my equipment sit idle. The problem was that finding the specific material for face shields was almost impossible (for good reasons).

In the meantime, I had noticed a few people locally asking “anyone know where I can get some buttons in town?” I quickly designed and made a few simple buttons with a little message for the great people who sew them and to those who wear them. I then teamed up with a local maker store called Rustically Signed to get a few thousand buttons for sewing kits out to people in Kawartha Lakes eager to put their sewing machines to work.

The next day, I was overwhelmed with message requests for buttons and not just locally so, I created this page to stay organized. The next morning, I had “orders” for over 40,000 buttons. When I was considering pausing the stock so I could catch up, I received an order for 60,000 buttons from the Canada Sews Facebook group. This request jumped the total to over 100,000….time to pause for a bit.

Although I have been able to produce 4000-5000 buttons per day in my shop, I obviously needed help so I enlisted anyone willing to donate material and also anyone willing to drop sheets of acrylic into their lasers (check out their info below). I even have my enthusiastic 3 year old reminding me when its time to head out to the garage to refill my “kin-chine”. We are making great progress and am happy to say that I think we will hit the mark.

So I guess the answer is why not! Facemask straps are hurting the ears of the amazing font line people wearing them constantly during this time. Although laser cutting buttons may not be directly helping our front line workers, these little buttons seem to be helping thousands of people staying safe at home who want to help, to keep on helping.

I can’t say how appreciative I am of everyone who has been giving their time and resources and the amazing positivity this is spreading!

Have a great day!

-Dan Kitchen (aka the button guy…apparently)

dan@makestuffmove.com

Special Thanks!

We couldn’t do this alone