This review gives the reader a detailed idea of what went on at our Goodwill—over and above the much-heralded, super-obvious merger. While I feel a little guilty about the length, I won’t apologize. To cover the real substance of what goes on in this organization takes time and space. The reader has the option of reading this in segments. I would hasten to add that this report is but ‘highlights.’ Much, much more happens that isn’t included here.

 

Robert “Bob” Holderbaum, February 2008

 

WEBSITE. Both pre-merger Goodwills had websites. Both were outdated; neither was inspiring. During 2007, we launched a website for our new Goodwill. To use contemporary jargon, “It rocks!” There are photos and art work. There’s an inter-active job application so that persons may apply for work—electronically. Website improvements and additions occurred during the year.  www.goodwillcmh.org     We list our programs and services. We have “Whistleblower” opportunities. We offer communications links to board and staff. The public can find stores, donation locations, and much more.

 

C.A.R.F. ACCREDITATION. CARF is the Commission for the Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities. It is an independent organization that, in effect, ‘certifies’ our rehabilitation programs and services. However, it looks at much more in its survey than simply services and programs. It looks at health and safety. It looks at our financial practices. It looks at how we govern our organization. Having merged March 1, 2007, and with the CARF surveyors due at the two campuses in late-August, we faced an incredible challenge. We sought accreditation for the merged entity—and a great many things hadn’t yet been melded together. The best possible outcome is the three-year accreditation we achieved. Most notable was the fact that there was but one recommendation in the human resources area and no recommendations in the health & safety area……one of the most comprehensive sections of the CARF manual.

 

# SERVED IN JACKSON. One pre-merger concern was that the emphasis in services/programs in Jackson might be diminished. More persons were served in Jackson during 2007, 1,112, than during 2006.

 

M.P.R.I. The Michigan Prisoner Reentry Initiative is a project of the State of Michigan. The Battle Creek campus participated for one year and served many recently-released prisoners. Then the Jackson campus received its contract. The Jackson experience resulted in a considerable amount of positive publicity and exposure for Goodwill Industries in the Jackson area.

 

EXCEL PROGRAM. This program, serving the participants of Summit Pointe (Calhoun County’s arm of Community Mental Health), grew to 25 participants.

 

GOODWILL WORKS/HASTINGS. First, Goodwill Works is a curriculum we devised several years ago for the population that transitions from welfare to work. This past year, we added a component in Hastings. (Due to our forethought in building our store there--including a class-room-size room, we are able to hold the training program at our Hastings Goodwill store.)

 

RETURN-TO-WORK. This is a program, operated at the B.C. Campus, to assist employers in the area. Their injured employees come to Goodwill to perform “light duty” work. Referrals to that program grew in 2007.

 

COMMUNITY PLACEMENTS IN B.C. Many new partnerships were formed in the community so that more participants could be placed in jobs.

 

YOUTH IN TRANSITION. The Workforce Development Dept. at the Jackson campus designed and held Youth in Transition classes for Jackson-area high school students.

 

FOUR SEASONS. In what was a mutual initiative between the B.C. Contracts and Workforce Development Depts., the Four Seasons operation was formed. The service is designed to do yard work, and other grounds maintenance in the warmer months—and snow removal in the winter. One contract was secured immediately--Neighborhoods, Inc.—maintaining several dozen properties Neighborhoods controls. Another contract secured was to keep clean (of litter) the streets of Ft. Custer Industrial Park.

 

NEW/EXPANDING CONTRACTS AT THE BATTLE CREEK CAMPUS. Work came in from Hastings Fiberglass. The production of TACLIPs takes us into commercial sewing—an area of expertise that could prove valuable in another ways. TRMI is a Japanese-owned manufacturing plant across the street from Goodwill’s Ft. Custer Ind. Park campus. One new project began in 2007—another is due in 2008. Goodwill continued to expand its Good – Scents air freshener business. We marketed the product to other Goodwill retail systems across the country—with success. We also market it through high school athletic conventions.

 

JACKSON ENCLAVES. These [ON-claves] are teams of Goodwill workers who operate in the community. Jackson had three enclaves when the merger occurred. One was at Industrial Steel Treating. That relationship is growing; Goodwill now has 23 production-type employees there-- spread across all three shifts. There’s also a strong possibility Goodwill be doing janitorial work for Industrial Steel. 

 

WEBSITE LINK. This is one of the many improvements made to the new Goodwill website. There had been an informational page. Now a prospective donor may enter information which allows Goodwill to do—in effect—a pre-screening of the vehicle.

 

MORE VEHICLES PLACED. The Wheels program placed more vehicles in 2007 (53) than in 2006 (47). It received fewer calls and fewer actual vehicles donated but the quality of the vehicles received was improved over the prior year.

 

PROGRAM SPREAD IN JACKSON. While we actually started the service to Jackson in 2006, we established a Jackson Wheels advisory committee in 2007, bringing in members of the community to help us market the program in the greater Jackson area.

 

DONATION CENTERS/STATIONS. Technically only one of the four donations operations started in 2007—the Lake Lansing Road “center.” (A center is a permanent, store-type building while a “station” is a portable facility we locate somewhere.) However, the Okemos Center opened in late-December ’06 and the Donation Station at East Jackson Plaza opened very early in January 2008.  We also have an ADS in Eaton Rapids.

 

GOODWILL CELEBRATES 50 YEARS IN ALBION. We had a variety of things going on in Albion to help celebrate Goodwill’s 50-year presence in Albion.

 

OPENED “AS IS” STORE IN CHARLOTTE. This concept is still in its infancy. The purpose of an ‘as is’ store is to take items that didn’t sell in our regular stores—and things unworthy of display in our regular stores. It’s one last chance to sell items before Goodwill has to pay to landfill things—which, isn’t the best solution environmentally. The As Is store was opened. 

 

RELOCATION OF THE CEDAR STORE. We relocated the previous Cedar store only a half-mile up the street. One would think that’d be no big deal, right? Well, we were relocating both a retail operation and a donations-collection operation. And, we needed to tell the entire City of Lansing about that. It was a considerable challenge. The newer store is much larger and much more visually appealing than where we were.

 

P.O.S. IN ALL STORES. In what can only be described as one incredible job…after the merger was complete, Point-of-Sale equipment was installed in all 13 retail stores. P.O.S. consists of “electronic cash registers” which simplify the purchase process then automatically report sales information to Goodwill’s “main frame” computers at the Jackson campus. This allows for sales information to be directed straight into the accounting system—unlike the old system where information was faxed to the office, then manually entered into the system.

 

SIZING IN ALL STORES. For many years our retail stores used colorization to present our clothing. As the name implies, all blouses—for example—were hung by color and not by size. It made for highly attractive racks. Sizing all garments means more cost to Goodwill. However, many customers wanted the convenience of shopping by size. It is quicker for the shopper. This was by no means an easy transition for Goodwill. It’s also something where we can’t “prove” that it did or didn’t improve sales. We’re hopeful it will increase sales. 

 

RETAIL TRAINING MANUAL STANDARDIZED. The ‘Battle Creek Goodwill’ had eight stores; the ‘Jackson Goodwill’ had five stores. While at first blush, both systems “sold stuff,” there was a myriad of systems on each side. Forms differed. Procedures differed. Well, there is now a standardized training manual for the merged Goodwill’s entire retail system. No small feat. 

 

shopgoodwill.com. Our Goodwill doesn’t operate “shop.” The website’s operated by a Goodwill in California. However, the entire face of “shop” was upgraded. Our best 2007 ‘shop’ sale was a huge jar of apparently-valuable marbles (yup, marbles!) that sold for $541.

 

ACCOUNTING SYSTEMS. Each pre-merger Goodwill had its own accounting system, supported its own computer system. One absolutely incredible obstacle has been merging all of our accounting into one accounting system and generating timely reports.

 

FINANCE DEPT. MOVES. Late in the year the entire accounting operation was moved from the Battle Creek campus to the Jackson campus. Pre-merger payrolls were weekly at the Jackson campus and every other week at the Battle Creek campus. We went to one, bi-weekly payroll. We then realized it’d be easier to have a payroll weekly, but it’d be the ‘east’ one week and the ‘west’ the following week.

 

JOINT POLICIES/PROCEDURES AND STANDARDIZED BENEFITS. While senior staff was involved in the review of the joint policies, the real nitty – gritty of combining the two pre-merger Goodwills’ policies and procedures was an incredible task and fell largely to H.R. There was also the standardization of benefits. Accomplishing all of this--in ways that NO post-merger Goodwill employee emerged with fewer benefits--became an incredible challenge. Resolved successfully.

 

Marketing really crosses all of the departments plus those things that are “organization-wide.” I’ve tried to separate out the items that were marketing efforts related to specific events or issues.

 

TOY RECALL EFFORTS. With all the toy recall efforts going on last year, Goodwill had two challenges: One was to keep banned products from what went on our store floors for display and ultimate sale. Second, we needed to help reassure the public that Goodwill was doing the very best it could to keep items banned by the CPSC (Consumer Product Safety Commission) from being sold in our stores. We have an incredible system. Each store receives copies of the documents banned by the government. Attempting to stay current and teach others is a highly difficult job. In the fall, a CPSC inspector visited one of our Lansing stores and did not find even one banned product on our store floor! Given the tons and tons of donations processed by our Goodwill, that is an incredible achievement.

 

LANSING AREA MARKETING. Opening a new store or offering a new service, even in cities as large as Jackson and Battle Creek is relatively easy compared to the half-mile relocation (on the same street) of the Cedar store in Lansing. There are so many print media and there are even more electronic (primarily radio) options. How do we best tell the greater Lansing area—so we gain new customers and volunteers, instead of losing current shoppers/donors? We also added the much-smaller, more specialized Attended Donation Centers in the Lansing area. Putting that news out and shaping peoples’ behavior—it’s a most difficult task.

 

TERRITORY WIDE P.R. We have activities and employees in seven counties—and the number of cities and towns we serve is even greater. We’ve mixed print with radio media. We started using billboards. While we’ve done some isolated TV advertising, we looking at doing even more. We used a billboard on I – 94 near Albion. We’re now using them in Jackson—to promote the Attended Donation Station there—and on I – 69 near Charlotte, to promote the As Is store.

 

JACKSON EFFORTS. We’ve had a number of initiatives in the Battle Creek area over the years. We’ve done more in Jackson than was done before the merger. We push the Wheels program, we now push our new donations station at E. Jackson Plaza, we’ve had staff on the local Bart Hawley TV program, and we participated in JAXPO (a business exposition organized by the Chamber of Commerce).

 

SPEAKING OF THE CHAMBER… For many, many years I’ve been committed to a policy that our Goodwill should be a part of the Chamber of Commerce in any town where we have activity. That not only makes sense in terms of creating a ‘presence’ but it also gives us valuable information as to what else is going on in each area.

 

JACKSON CAMPUS FACELIFT. The Mechanic Street face of Goodwill (the front of the store and the interior) underwent a significant face-lift last year. The store’s exterior looks much better than before. We also installed a new surface—to the gravel area behind the building—to improve the donor experience. Inside the Jackson campus, a number of “facelift”-type things were done. One of the more significant was that the entire store was repainted—taking it from the dark, black ceiling to a much, much brighter appearance.

 

This is another aspect of operations that is either the ‘doings’ of one department or the combined ‘doings’ of more than one department. I’m certain that this is not an all-inclusive list. 

 

Lending Hands of Michigan. Goodwill started working with a Kalamazoo-based not-for-profit, the mission of which is to collect all sorts of medical equipment, then lend it to persons who need it—for whatever length of time the borrowers need the equipment.

Earth Day. With other Michigan Goodwills, we collect computers and computer equipment in the spring. Most of this activity takes place in Lansing.

Book Drive. The Jackson campus partnered with the Jackson Rotary Club.

Blankets. The Jackson campus worked with a Jackson church to give 150 blankets to the poor.

Girl Scouts. Both campuses work with the Girl Scouts as the scouts collect donations.

Habitat for Humanity. The B.C. campus is able to place participants there—for work and training in construction, janitorial, or other kinds of work.

Weight Watchers. This partnership in early ’07 was to encourage weight losers to donate those then-too-large clothes to Goodwill.

PROJECT BUDDY-UP. We ended this program in early ’07. We worked with seven partner organizations which generated clothing donations. We paid them a percentage of the proceeds. 

 

I am involved in ‘marketing’ in a lot of ways. My most direct ‘marketing’ has been my ongoing Goodwill’s Bob program. I’ve taken the Goodwill message to some geographic areas that our print/radio marketing never touches. I know, from the reaction of my audiences, that I’m giving them information about Goodwill they would never have known otherwise. 

 

An entire book could be devoted to this topic alone. I’ve often said: It is incredible that two organizations—which shared a name (i.e., Goodwill Industries), a mission, and a county line for a boundary—could do so many things so differently.

 

Much of the “big picture” discussion/deliberations/decisions took place prior to 3/1/07. We had the difficult tasks of not only combining operations of the new Goodwill but we had two different boards, with each having a very different history and method of operation. Not only were the ‘mechanics’ different but there were human personalities involved, complicating things. 

 

Bottom line, however, reasonable minds prevailed. The merger happened. The board held its first couple of genuinely awkward board meetings. We’ve now progressed to where board committee meetings are occurring.

 

Of incredible significance, the board and senior staff met a full day in September. The result was a Strategic Plan for the new organization. It was fitting that, as one of the board’s final decisions of 2007, it made that Strategic Plan the blueprint for the organization—in 2008 and beyond.

 

It’s drastically understating all that occurred with the merger in these few paragraphs. However, to do it differently might tend to overshadow the accomplishments stated above.

 

The year just ended was an incredibly busy year. An organization’s success can be measured in many ways. The activities described above—most completed quite successively—comprise one measure of success. We have a hard-working, mission-driven staff that, despite the merger and other distractions in 2007, completed a great many things—with a high level of success.

 

I hope you’ve found this review of 2007 to be both educational and inspiring. I’ve been both inspired and educated as I’ve assembled the information for this review.

 

Bob Holderbaum, February 2008