After being laid off, Tampa father invents a safe sanitizer for shopping carts

Over the last several months, Adam Labadie has spent 15 hours a day on his computer and in his garage, creating an invention that will help the environment while keeping people healthy.

Labadie, a father of two from Tampa, was laid off at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic. While at the grocery store, he saw a trash can overflowing with wipes used to sanitize shopping carts, and he recalled seeing the same wipes in the ocean while he went snorkeling. "I wanted to find another solution," Labadie told WFTS. He decided to create a sanitation device that would eliminate the need for wipes, and the Arch Cart Sanitizer was born.

Bacteria can flourish on the handles of shopping carts, and the Arch Cart Sanitizer uses an organic, FDA- and EPA-approved solution that kills COVID-19, Labadie said. He is now working on getting his invention out to national supermarket chains for demos, and his hope is that it will be in use at stores by November or December. Catherine Garcia

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