Our mission is to provide beds and essential home furnishings to children and families in need.  This has an immediate, positive impact and provides part of the basic foundation on which a successful life can be built.

We encourage your thoughts, feedback and story ideas.  Please let us know what you think at friends@furniture-bank.org.

      Over the course of the year, the Furniture Bank will take in approximately 12,000 individual items to provide for children and families in need. A select number of

these items - approximately one percent - are used to support the Furniture

Bank's mission in a different way.

    

      In collaboration with the Assistance League® of Southeastern Michigan, those few items  with resale value are sold so we can fuel and repair our truck, maintain our facility and underwrite our programs that will serve approximately 2,400 families this year.  "If we take in a dresser and distribute it, we help a family." says executive director Rob Boyle. "But if we utilize a select few items that have resale value, the proceeds allow us to pick up more items and help many families."

      Martha Vargas will be sleeping a little more comfortably.  Martha, who lives in Pontiac, recently received a mattress, box spring and four chairs from the Furniture Bank of Southeastern Michigan. She's one of almost 2,000 clients we've helped this year. In the first ten months of 2011, the Furniture Bank provided beds and essential home furnishings to 1,947 local families in need.  Approximately 70-percent have annual household incomes of

less than $10,000 per year, with 85-percent having household incomes of under $20,000.

Join us on Facebook!  The Furniture Bank maintains a Facebook page where information about our upcoming events, available pickups, and news regardung the organization is available!

      The Furniture Bank thanks "Laugh out Loud Sponsors" Eastern Oil, First Presbyterian, Church of Pontiac, Group Associates and Steve & Rosemary Ricelli Scheidt; "Stand Up Sponsors" Baker College and Palmer Moving & Storage; and "Smile Sponsors" Advanced Bodywork,

      More than 220 people were on hand for the Furniture Bank's Second Annual Comedy Night Fundraiser, which was held on October 19 at Mark Ridley's Comedy Castle in Royal Oak. The event raised more than $28,000 to furnish hope to local families in need.

      Along with helping people like Martha, the Furniture Bank is committed to providing aid to children. In the past 12 months alone, the Furniture Bank's client-families have  included 800 children age four and under, and 1,200 children age five to 14. We've established specific programs that allow at-risk families to obtain new beds, cribs and pack'n'plays for their young ones.

      Comedy Night would not be possible without the efforts our event co-chairs, Heather Sullivan and Remo Antoniolli, as well as event committee members Dick Euler, Jason Miller and Pat Weber. Thanks also to our board members Victor Arbulu, Jeff Baytarian, Brian Laurain, Brett Miller, John Newman and Veronica Rickett.  Special thanks to Heidi Hedquist and Jaime Moy of Cahoots Marketing. The evening would not have been possible without all of the hard work of these wonderful people.

      Approximately half of our clients, like Martha, live in the city of Pontiac, with the remainder coming from a variety of communities including Mt. Clemens, Oak Park, Southfield and Waterford.

      On a monthly basis, we have an average of 175 families coming to us seeking help. They are pre-screened and referred to us by a network of 80 health and human service providers including the Michigan Department of Human Services, Lighthouse of Oakland County and OLHSA.

      The Furniture Bank truly appreciates your support and hopes you'll continue to help us carry out our mission to help more local families at risk.

Remo & Deborah Antoniolli, Dr. Michael Applefield, Autoliv ASP,  Dick & Nancy Euler, June Everett, Gleba & Associates, Jenkins Magnus Volk & Carroll,  Jason Miller & Beth Bernstein Miller, John & Sharon Newman, Pontiac Centerpoint  Business Campus (Etkin Equities), Bob & Sharon Smith, and Wound Clinics of America. Thanks also to Auch Construction, who had a small army of their great people attending the event.

As 2011 winds down, the Furniture Bank is on pace to provide more than 10,000 items to more than 2,300 clients. This means that more children are sleeping in beds instead of on floors, more families have tables around which to gather for a meal, and more families will live with the dignity that many of us take for granted.

In recent years, the economy has demanded that we change how we carry out our mission. And while there have been challenges along the way, we have embraced many of these changes. As a result, our programming has become much more effective, efficient and sustainable.

We've asked for a modest fee from our referral partners, or if they are unable to pay it, from the client themselves.  On average, $15 is paid and clients receive approximately $300 worth of gently-used furniture. While this is only five-percent of the furniture's value, it helps us to better cover our program expenses.  It also empowers those receiving items to make choices - hopefully good ones - and have more responsibility for the furniture they're receiving. If we're simply providing furniture to individuals who come back several times asking for items we've already given them, we're not moving the needle.

In 2012, we'll be making more changes still. We'll be altering some of our pickup policies to make our operation more sustainable, and looking to work more closely with select referral partners. Like all of our recent changes, they are for a sole purpose - to best carry out our mission to provide beds and essential home furnishings to children and families in need.

Thank you for your support.

      The Assistance League®, a volunteer-driven 501(c)3 nonprofit with a mission to improve the quality of life for those in need, operates the ReSale Connection consignment store on Main Street in downtown Rochester. It has also worked in conjunction with the Furniture Bank on Second Chance/Estate Sales in both the spring and fall. In 2011, this collaboration will raise more than $16,000 in support of the Furniture Bank's mission, as well as helping the Assistance League's worthy projects.

      Thanks to Kay Scheidt, Lorna Salmon, Valarie Westerly, Linda Chayka and all of the volunteers of the Assistance League®, as well as Pat Weber of the Furniture Bank. Great work!

      The Furniture Bank seeks volunteers interested in making a difference in their  community. We have a variety of engaging opportunities that include working on our fall fundraiser, getting involved with our board of directors or working directly with families we serve. For information about our volunteer opportunities, call  248-332-1300 x200 or e-mail friends@furniture-bank.org.

Beds for children and families in need are our highest demand item. The Furniture Bank has already provided more than 1100 beds to at-risk families in 2011, and we have more families coming to us in need of them on a daily basis.

We would therefore like to thank our friends at WJBK FOX 2 Detroit for producing a public service announcement that spotlights the need for gently-used beds. In it, FOX 2 Anchor Monica Gayle lets viewers

know that the Furniture Bank will pick up bed donations directly from the homes of donors.

If you live in Oakland or Macomb County, and have a gently-used bed that you would  like to donate for a family in need, call 248-332-1300 or visit our website at www.furniturebank.org.  We've also posted the FOX 2 public service announcement on our website at http://furniture-bank.org/bed psa.html.

      This year, the Furniture Bank has honored two exceptional individuals who have made longtime, outstanding contributions to our mission by presenting them with the Jill Lord Spirit of Volunteerism Award.  Jeanetta Jackson has volunteered for more than a decade since her retirement from OLSHA.  With great compassion and no small amount of good humor, she works directly with families in need and people seeking to donate furniture.  Despite health setbacks in recent years, Jeanetta continues to volunteer and we're so grateful she does. She is loved by all who have the pleasure of working with her.  Jeanetta's great work will also be spotlighted throughout the season on WJBK-FOX 2's Holiday Connection special.

    

      Dick Euler, a retired insurance executive and past board member, has also been advancing the Furniture Bank's cause for more than a decade. He's spearheaded sponsorship efforts for our Comedy Night fundraisers, as well as our Chair Affair galas before them.  Many people know Dick for his "unique" taste in hats - a turtle hat, a 20-gallon foam cowboy hat, and a flapping duck hat just to name a few - but those who know him well know his passion for helping those in need and worthy community causes.  The Spirit of Volunteerism Award is named after longtime volunteer and past board president Jill Lord, whose outstanding contribution helped sustain and grow the organization for more than decade.  Both Jeanetta and Dick are most deserving of this award and we're truly blessed to have them as members of the Furniture Bank family.

      For years, the Furniture Bank has provided free pickup service for our donors.  And while we will continue to do so, we will be modifying our policies in 2012 to continue offering free pickup while asking a small charge for the convenience of taking the items out of donors’ homes.

The Furniture Bank will still provide free pickup for donations of at least one of the

“Essential Items” needed by local families at risk.  We only ask that furniture donors leave those items on their porch or in their garage.

      For $20, furniture donors can take advantage of our We’ll Take It Out For You* pickup service, with our trained professional movers carefully removing Essential Items from your home.  All money collected will support the Furniture Bank’s mission of providing beds and essential home furnishings to children and families in need. 

      “We really think it’s important to continue offering this convenient service to our donors,” says Executive Director Rob Boyle.  “It’s a great value, and it doesn’t even completely cover our costs, but it will help us to continue carrying out our mission despite stubbornly high fuel prices and cutbacks that have been felt by just about every charity.”

       All furniture donations – whether we’re taking it out of your home or garage – are still tax-deductible.  But most importantly, they’ll be helping local children and families in need to establish a stable home in which they can live.

We welcome your feedback and questions about these changes at 248-332-1300 or friends@furniture-bank.org.