From the Warehouse
Social Media Highlighting Flourish Donors & Volunteers
I created social media content that showcased the oftentimes un-seen day-to-day happenings in the warehouse.
I created a social media series to bring visibility to the everyday magic happening behind the scenes at Flourish—from furniture donations and volunteer repair projects to the stunning variety of items made available for our guests each week. These posts offered a glimpse into the warehouse’s inner workings, where countless unseen acts of generosity help furnish 30–40 homes every single week. By weaving in appeals for financial gifts, item donations, and volunteer service, these stories served to inspire others to contribute, as well.
Background & Goals
Flourish is powered by a dedicated community of 2,000+ volunteers and furniture donors. On average, it takes 25 volunteer hours to furnish a single home—hours spent driving trucks, repairing pieces, and curating household essentials. But in the fast pace of our daily operations, these moments of care can easily go unnoticed.
My goal was to highlight the rich, behind-the-scenes efforts that make each home furnished by Flourish possible—centering the volunteers, donors, and day-to-day activity that form the backbone of our mission.
Impact
By pairing compelling visuals with thoughtful storytelling, I helped create a stronger emotional connection between our online community and the work happening in our warehouse. Over my time at Flourish:
Followers & Subscribers increased by 116% from 5,600 to 12,150 across platforms
Engagement increased by 30% across platforms
New volunteers increased by 280%, from 268 to 1,062 annually
New furniture donors increased by 310% from 284 to 1,179 annually
Social Media Videos
These short videos offered our supporters a window into the daily rhythm, joy, and intentionality of life in the Flourish warehouse. From playful moments with volunteers to behind-the-scenes looks at furniture repairs, dishpacking, and curated showroom finds, each video was designed to spark curiosity and highlight the care that goes into furnishing every home. Whether leading a tour, staging a pillow fight, or showcasing an artist's eye for design, I used video to bring Flourish’s mission to life.
Social Media Posts
Every post I create for Flourish is grounded in a simple goal: invite people into the story. Whether I’m highlighting a volunteer project, a warehouse improvement, or a donor’s impact, I weave in fundraising appeals, donation calls, and volunteer recruitment in ways that feel natural and emotionally resonant.
By grounding our messaging in real moments—joyful, scrappy, generous—I helped grow our community of support while deepening engagement. These posts showcase how storytelling can transform even the smallest moment in the warehouse into a compelling invitation to act.
The Sorting Team has been working their magic again—this time in the kitchenware aisle!
They’ve been carefully grouping cooking utensils, pots, pans, baking sheets, warmers, and more into tidy, labeled categories. Their mission: ensuring our showroom is a welcoming, dignified space that’s easy to navigate.
For many of our guests, shopping for an entire home in just 45 minutes can feel overwhelming. But thanks to the thoughtful work of Patty, Janet, and the entire Sorting Team, our space feels calmer, more organized, and more like home.
Every family deserves a place to gather.
Thanks to a donation of surplus shelving from a local architectural firm, our volunteers are handcrafting new coffee and end tables—two of the most requested items in our showroom, and often the hardest to keep in stock.
Big thanks to our ingenious woodworking volunteers!
Last month, Flourish took a bold step: leasing 9,500 square feet of additional warehouse space. Why?
Because more families are moving into empty homes with nothing but blankets on the floor.
Because we’ve heard too many parents say the beds they received at Flourish would be their child’s first.
Because, as Haley, a guest who visited us this month, put it: “If it wasn't for you guys, I’d still be living with just paper plates.”
That's why this new space is a game changer: it helps us accept more donations, furnish more homes, and offer every guest more choice.
But it comes at a cost: $3,600/month.
We need your help to make this growth sustainable.
Donate to the New Space Fund to furnish homes for hundreds of families this year.
Thank you for showing our neighbors this community cares.
Vicki, one of our amazing volunteer Showroom Hosts, recently brought us these beautiful hand-embroidered towels lovingly made by a friend!
Each towel was crafted with care and will bring joy touch to a family's home.
If you have a special talent — sewing, knitting, woodworking, or anything creative — we’d love to help share your gifts with families who are starting over.
Come by the warehouse and let your creativity be part of someone’s fresh start!
A huge thank you to the Kauffman Stadium and the Kansas City Royals!
During their recent renovation, the Royals partnered with Flourish to re-home dozens of tables and chairs. Those items are now on the Showroom Floor and going home with families every day!
A big shoutout also goes to Randy and our incredible team of Volunteer Drivers who work hard to collect items all across the city.
Teamwork makes the dream work.
Happy New Year's, Everyone! We're ready to get started stronger than ever.
Bob brought in another big load of furniture before the break. Bob takes home broken down furniture and fixes them in his home shop. Thanks for your home work, Bob!!
To get a fresh start in the new year, bring your unneeded furniture to Flourish! You will feel SO much better finally getting rid of those extra items taking up space in your home and mind.
Furnish a fresh start for a neighbor instead!
Drop off donations at our dock 9 am - 12 pm, Tuesday through Saturday, or schedule a pickup!
A big thank you to Thrivent for sponsoring a bed!
Thrivent is an organization that combines financial services with generosity solutions. Through their Action Teams program, in which Thrivent dedicates set aside dollars to local nonprofits, a Thrivent donor requested that the project be dedicated to purchasing a new bed. Thanks to their dedication to giving back, a family will now sleep soundly in a comfortable bed!
Learn more about Thrivent opportunities on our website.
Thanks also go to Stacy and Fin, Flourish volunteers, for their hard work assembling beds for Flourish guests!
If you've been to Flourish recently, you've probably noticed some changes! Volunteers have been reworking every square inch of our workshops. To fuel our progress, we had a secret weapon - Julia Scott, owner of Efficiently Neat!
Efficiently Neat is a professional organizing service. When we approached Julia with our project, she didn't know what she was getting into! But with the passion and dedication of our volunteer crews, we've turned the warehouse upside down, building in new and more innovative repair processes and storage systems. These improvements will be critical as we look towards furnishing even more homes next year.
A huge thank you to the Mid-America Regional Council Solid Waste Management District and the Missouri Department of Natural Resources! Their grant funding enabled us to take on this massive reorganizing project. Their investment, combined with our volunteers' brilliance and Julia's guidance, will help keep hundreds of tons more furniture out of landfills and in families' homes.
Because of the hard work from volunteers, Julia, and the MARC SWMD & MDNR, we're living into our tagline as the place where compassion meets sustainability.
Thank you to everyone who helped fill our showroom with beautiful upholstered furniture!
Last month, we furnished 151 homes, impacting the lives of 453 children and adults. That's our highest number on record. We could not meet this need without our amazing community that responds in full force during times of need.
Keep it coming! As we get into the holiday season, upholstered furniture is a key part of social and family gatherings. Furnish a home for the holidays by scheduling a furniture pickup, volunteering your time, or sponsoring a family with a monetary contribution.
Over the summer, we had the opportunity to partner with Operation Breakthrough's Ignition Lab! The Ignition Lab is an advanced STEM program for high school students. The Product Design class created welcome home kits for Flourish families, each including a set of household tools, coasters, key bowls, and wall hooks. Using advanced laser-cutting and 3D printing tools, students took the entire project from planning to completion.
Their efforts were a huge success! After hitting the showroom floor, the welcome home kits went out the door FAST. Thanks to these incredible young peoples' creativity, neighborhood families now have beautiful, hand-crafted decor to make their new houses feel like home.
Operation Breakthrough is a non-profit providing a nurturing and safe environment for children in Kansas City's urban core. Through robust education, care, aid, and advocacy, they empower children and their families. Operation Breakthrough is a long-time Flourish referring partner, furnishing more than 15 students' homes every year.
Dressers, dressers, dressers! Huge thanks to the Kansas City South Rotary for not only purchasing 10 dressers for our families, but also for coming to our warehouse and putting them together! As we are now serving up to 10 families a day, these dressers are sure to head out to their new homes very soon.
Flourish has an exciting new partnership with Electro Mundo, an up-and-coming electronics recycler in Kansas City! Electro Mundo recycles e-waste including computers, TVs, and small appliances. Then, they refurbish still-good computers and give them away for free to families in our community.
Electro Mundo partnered with Flourish to provide computers to families during the Flourish shopping appointment. Now, these beautiful refurbished computers line our showroom shelves! A huge thank you to Electro Mundo for expanding digital access to those in our community who need internet the most.
Learn more about their mission on their website!
Virgil dedicates hours to vacuuming sofas each week. Because of individual acts of giving like his, Flourish is not just a service—It's a community fueled by generosity.
We're inviting you to honor someone special in your life who exemplifies this spirit by making a donation in their name. Your gift will celebrate their commitment while making a direct impact by fully furnishing a family's home. Honor a Flourish volunteer, someone you admire, someone who benefited from Flourish's services, or someone who values sustainability and the comfort of home.
Click the box next to "Dedicate This Gift" and share your honoree's contact info - we'll send them a custom card to acknowledge your gesture.
With summer coming to a close, we wanted to take a moment to express our gratitude to all the volunteers and students that helped support our mission during these past few months! These hardworking individuals loaded furniture, packed donations, assembled beds, and so much more!
Please join us in wishing these volunteers the very best with whatever comes next!
The Flourish Wood Shop (aka Elves Workshop) had a massive upgrade!
Woodworking volunteer Bob led the charge to renovate a huge area of work space, allowing us to consolidate woodworking equipment and install more effective safety measures (like the dust collector Bob is demonstrating!)
With new lighting and new outlets, the woodshop is ready to accommodate more woodworkers to repair furniture for Flourish families than ever before.
A huge thank you to Bob and our team of fearless woodworkers!
Flourish beds volunteer Ted built a brand-new racking system for mattresses!
This huge improvement allowed us to begin stacking mattresses on two levels rather than one. With greater organization, we can store more beds for more families at a time.
With a 27% increase in items given away during the first half of the year, it's critical that our storage space stays lean. That way, we can move donations in and send them back out with up to 40 families every week.
A huge thank you to Ted and our incredible volunteer Bed Team!
A big shout-out goes to our outstanding volunteer group from Evergy: Jona, Dawn, Andrea, and Melissa!
Evergy is a big Flourish supporter. From donating light bulbs for Flourish guests, to volunteering as a team, to investing in our mission with a recent grant, Evergy is committed to making an impact directly in families' homes.
Thank you to the Evergy team for helping our neighbors in times of need. You made a lasting difference for 8 families! This group certainly accomplished what they set out to do: SPREAD GOOD ENERGY!
We need support for the Flourish Bed Fund!!! This, unfortunately, was the last queen mattress in our warehouse last week.
Flourish has seen an increasing need for beds with 2 added shopping appointments per day (10 total). To bridge the gap in donated mattresses, an anonymous donor has agreed to match every donation put towards the Bed Fund – dollar for dollar.
Please consider giving toward our need for additional mattresses to serve 40 families each week. A bed is an invaluable resource that provides rest, comfort, safety and dignity. Because of one individual’s commitment, the impact of your dollar will be doubled for someone in our community.
So far, we’ve been able to purchase 10 new beds with $600 in donated funds and $600 matched. These mattresses were critical for the 107 families we had the privilege of assisting last month, including 159 children living in the homes we furnished.
EVERY GIFT makes a huge difference! Donate today to purchase a brand-new bed and transform a home in Kansas City.
Donate to the Bed Fund here.
Amy and Tate discovered Flourish while looking for a place to donate furniture. They had a basement full of items left over after their kids had moved out for college.
On their first trip, the mattress they brought went home with a family before they made it back out the door. A week later, they returned with their daughter, Steph, and a U-Haul full of tables, chairs, sofas, cookware and household goods.
We furnished 31 homes last week, with an average of 45 items going to every family. That's 1,395 items - including beds, upholstered, and wooden furniture - that we collected and sent back out.
We couldn't keep up without dedicated folks like Amy, Tate, and Steph who go the extra mile to donate to Flourish. Thank you for making sure your furniture goes directly into the homes of neighbors. Your kindness means the world!!!
Last Saturday, we were paid a visit by The Hive Women of OP!
This incredible group came ready to jump into jobs all across Flourish's warehouse, showroom, and workshops. From creating dish sets to moving furniture for our guests, they used their skill, creativity, and boundless enthusiasm to make a lasting difference for seven families through home furnishings.
Many hands make light work! The Hive's mission is to connect women through service, educational, and service events. Thank you for giving your time to create safe, comfortable homes for our neighbors.
PSA: Cancel your gym membership!!!
Why pay to work out when you could sling furniture for free? Whether you’re hauling sofas, moving mattresses, or loading boxes, Flourish offers a range of workouts designed for your personal fitness goals. Check out the muscles on our volunteers if you need any proof of our results.
Sign up to volunteer and use your workout for a good cause!
Exciting news!!! This week, Flourish teamed up with Rockhurst University and UMKC to collect furniture and household goods from students leaving for the summer. Thanks to their partnership, we now have a large donation of essential furniture and home goods that will go a long way in transforming the homes of those in need.
As you may know, our work at Flourish is a critical part of more than 70 major social service agencies’ aid programs in Kansas City. Through our combined efforts, we have already furnished 359 entire homes this year alone, and we are committed to continuing the momentum. A huge thank you to our partners at Rockhurst and UMKC for their help making sure unneeded furniture goes directly into homes!
To get the essential items we collected to families as quickly as possible, we need all hands on deck! We could really use your help sorting donations tomorrow, Saturday, May 13th. We'd love to see you tomorrow any time between 8:30 AM and 3 PM at our warehouse, 11971 Grandview Road, Suite A.