Part One - Joe Cianciotto Interview

As we reach the five-year anniversary of the COVID I am looking back and reconnecting with standout individuals that stepped up in their local communities during the pandemic to discuss the perspective of that time.

I first came across Joe Cianciotto, watching News 12, who was running a grassroots donation effort to provide PPE to healthcare workers and running the now-defunct Support-GC-Local website to help local small businesses in Garden City stay afloat.

In that time, like so many of us, he has gone back to his version of ‘normal,’ but in his story, like so many others, hoping to capture an understanding of the human spirit in times of crisis. In this multi-part interview, I will be digging in deep on these themes.

Q: Great to connect Joe. So, I’ll get right to it. When I look Joe Cianciotto up on LinkedIn, I see someone who has worked for twenty years in advertising. How does an ad agency creative director end up leading a PPE effort locally in Garden City?
A: Ha, that is the question, right? So, in the time prior to the pandemic, I was working very closely with an amazing production and design company 71 Visuals based in Hauppauge, who specialize in environmental design and generally fabricate everything from concept to completion. The founders, Brian and Craig Geiger, whom I have known for decades, have always been tremendously civic-minded, so when the pandemic hit and they saw that there was a shortage of PPE for healthcare workers, in about 24 hours, they pivoted their workflow and facility and immediately began fabricating these plastic face shields.
So, I think in seeing them step up in this way, I was immediately hooked and inspired and signed up to help in any way I could.

Q: So how did this play into your efforts in Garden City with the local hospitals?
A: Great question! So, at the outset, the initial challenge was that Hospitals couldn’t find avenues to purchase this equipment. And when factoring in material, the folks at 71 Visuals were able to make these available at cost (with no profit) for $3.00 per shield.
When the guys went about providing this material to the hospitals, while inexpensive, it was not a mass-produced product, so even at cost, they were rough $1.50 more than the current unit prices of the shipments from China.
Now to set the table, it was mid-March and not only were so many people dying, the hospital staff and first responders were themselves falling ill, so when we spoke with the hospitals, they were just glad to have access to the shields.

However, when we engaged with purchasing, not a single hospital group’s finance department were willing to go on the record paying the extra $1.50 per unit and rejected the supply. That was when it became clear, the only way to get the hospital to accept the PPE, was if the equipment was donated. This would be the beginning of my central role in this endeavor to ensure that we could overcome this barrier.

(In part two, we’ll learn more about Joe’s role in this.)