ANOKA, Minn. — All that glitters is not gold at the Federal Premium manufacturing plant in Anoka, but for the recipients, it might as well be.
"We are going to donate a million rounds of ammunition to the Ukrainian forces," Federal Ammunition President Jason Vanderbrink said, "We did that because we stand for freedom and wanted to promote democracy in the world."
Vanderbrink said this was a way to help in a way they know how.
"Part of the leadership team just got together and said how can we help out the Ukrainian people?" he said. "Whether it be the Department of Defense, the refugees, the humanitarian crisis — we just got together and as a team we thought we obviously are a major player in the ammunition market in the world so we certainly can help the defense department with ammunition."
This as the nation is battling a years-long ammunition shortage. This was something that had happened before the pandemic.
"There is an ammo shortage, but this doesn't take away from the commercial market," Vanderbrink explained. "It's just the right thing to do. When we see people fighting for democracy and fighting for freedom, we have to do our part to help those forces out. It was very simple, we had to do it because in our view, it's simply the right thing to do."
And the company that churns out live rounds hasn't forgotten about the lives, deeply affected by the crisis.
"We're going to sell T-shirts at remington.com and federalpremium.com and the proceeds go to the humanitarian crisis we see unfolding under our eyes every day," Vanderbrink said. "So we're not only helping the Defense Department with our ammunition, but we're gonna get a lot of profits to the humanitarian crisis for the refugees."
As we sit in disbelief about how the situation has continued to unfold in devastating ways, Vanderbrink said the consumers have shown him, what they care about.
"You see people leaving their dad to fight in Ukraine as the families go Poland or wherever. We cannot ever forget that it's a humanitarian crisis as well. We hope we raise a lot of money, and 100% of the profits will go to a charity to go to a refugee crisis, and I hope we have to reorder T-shirts many, many times."
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