CAMBRIDGE -- A Cambridge company that pivoted to supplying hand sanitizer during a global shortage has seen a drop in demand.

Avaria Health and Beauty said long-term contracts are to blame.

The company's equipment is now sitting idle. A few months ago, there were thousands of bottles filled with sanitizer every day.

"There were periods during the pandemic where we were producing in excess of 5,000 litres of hand sanitizer a day to realize the demand," managing partner Juston Sharratt said.

Sharratt said the company stepped up to make sanitizer when it was desperately needed.

"Our main partners were all three area hospitals," he said. "Also nursing homes throughout southern Ontario, paramedic associations, municipalities."

However, demand has since come to a halt. Sharratt said they have hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of raw product sitting on the shelf waiting to be turned into sanitizer, including alcohol. He said it's difficult to access long-term contracts.

"We are working with the PPE suppliers to try and find a solution to open up the marketplace to primarily domestic sources of PPE," Sharratt said.

McMaster business professor Marvin Ryder said over-production becomes a problem as demand changes.

"It's a balancing act," he said. "How much capability can we afford to keep in hot idle status and how much are we prepared to let go knowing that some companies can turn on a dime and come back."

“We launched Supply Ontario, a centralized supply chain agency that will stabilize access to a high-quality supply of critical products for the public sector, including PPE. These are Ontario-made solutions to an ever-growing global concern that will support our effort to reopen the economy and relieve the province of depending on unreliable global supply chains. In fact, 74% of the forecasted PPE spend for the next 18 months will be with Ontario or Canadian based manufacturers," a statement from the Ministry of Government and Consumer Services said in part.

Sharratt said it's been frustrating, but they are taking it in stride.

"We really got an idea of what a global pandemic can do to a supply chain if you are not effectively equipped from a domestic standpoint," he said.