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Safest And Shortest Method To Self-Support

From: Papers Presented At First Annual Goodwill Conference
Creator: J.S. Nicholson (author)
Date: February 1920
Source: Goodwill Industries International, Inc., Archives, Robert E. Watkins Library

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Keep your contributors informed concerning the work. I think the best way is to start out with a small paper printed on a multigraph. See that every bag contributor has one of these papers. Let them know that something worth while is being done. Do not ask too frequently for money but stress the gift of things the folks are through with. Let them see how their contribution will help to support the chauffeur, his helper, the one who handles things at the plant, the sorter, the mender, the stock clerk, the sales lady, the office force, and many others. Never run out of bags. Dr. Helms says keep five thousand bags on hand, that means about $2500. I fear this is heavy to lie dormant in bags. I do not advise newspaper advertising, but I would try to have the story of what we are doing brought before the public every now and then. In every legitimate way that you think of keeping the Goodwill idea before the people. Let them know that here is "Loving Service to Save the Waste." Make every effort to have an institution strongly interdenominational. Solicit from everybody.

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Now as to the outgo. First of all get a committee of representative businessmen who can advise you in both your purchases of equipment and of your sales. Do not overload with equipment. Try to get things off your hands as quickly as possible. Be extremely careful as to price. Let your pricing be done with the real worth of the object in view and the need of the individual who will probably buy it. Locate your store where the people who will naturally purchase your goods, reside. Let them know that you are there to help them make good. Let them not merely be customers but let them know you are their friend. Once you put a price on an article never change it. Make the store as attractive and as cheerful as you can. Do not act as if you were bestowing a favor on a customer. Let your transactions be business transactions between friends. Pay your opportunity workers as much as you can so that they can live on what they get. Encourage them to take other jobs that will mean better wages and conditions for them. I think the beneficent workers should get as much as they could get if employed in the same work elsewhere. Don't encourage the thought that because one is working for the Lord, therefore that one must work for less money than if he is working for the world, the flesh and the devil.

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One hundred thousand dollars a year means three hundred and thirty dollars a day. This is more than the main store of the Morgan Memorial sold after at least fifteen years of business. We are not to expect to do this ourselves in our first year. I do believe that if we follow the methods I have set forth, we will arrive safely in the speediest manner at our goal.

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