Donors for small goods-other than furniture

Once you have contacted even one social service agency or shelter, you should quickly have a list of needs. Now to find the goods!  This will change depending on where you are in the country and as the organization grows in size and age.  But we have always had a saying 'never turn down a good donation- we will find the space'.  In the early days we worked out of rental storage boxes. Several times huge tractor trailer sized donations of mattresses or clothing would come in. We worked deals with the landlord for unrented spaces and now we rent emtpy trailer bodies.  You just have to be ready for a little bit of organized chaos.

The best source of goods and the foundaiton of the Project is our email tree. This can be as simple as your private email account. Just ask friends if they are willing to be contacted about specific urgent needs and many will join and tell their friends. As of this writing our email tree has more than 2,100 primary contacts for our weekly Urgent E-news.

Thrift stores: many will make deals if you get to know them

Online match services: such as CraigsList and Freecycle.org

Church/House of Worship newsletters

Yard sales

Other charities: most have things to get rid of that are in their way

Neighbors, friends etc. -best colution for really urgent needs

Schools will collect for drives - less urgent more seasonal goods

Buy it, but buy it very inexpensively: Items like toiletries, diapers, food, underwear, we have purchased when we cannot get them donated. The trick to to watch things you continue to have a need for and find a way to get them donated by manufacturing companies, through goods-drives or by collecting from charites that have excess.

Hotels: are a great source of bedding and can provide toiletries and furniture