During my career working with 3PLs, many clients I have worked with are genuinely good charitable people who truly want to be helpful and solve their customers’ problems. Also, the nature of being a 3PL means they must remain extremely flexible for the type of customers or goods that they handle. This benevolence and flexibility are built into their DNA.
Flexibility is key to adapting to quick changes and also evolving to long-term market changes. For example, I have seen a general long-term shift with traditional 3PL Bulk storages evolving to handle eCommerce. Regarding short term flexibility, 3PLs can use their assets and resources to help mobilize on short notice to benefit their communities. By running a quick capacity report, they can also see immediately how much available capacity they can offer for lending assistance.
There are a variety of ways 3PLs can contribute to their community based on the type of response needed. And in our experience, supporting a seasoned disaster relief organization like the American Logistics Aid Network is the best way to do so. This week’s blog will explore the many ways you can contribute to ALAN for Hurricane and other disaster relief efforts.
Geoff Greenhill, Director of Sales, Camelot 3PL Software
Pre-Offer Goods And Services
ALAN facilitates disaster recovery efforts by connecting non-profits with businesses that are willing to donate goods and/or supply chain services in five primary categories:
- Transportation
- Warehousing
- Material Handling Equipment
- Packaging and Distribution Supplies
- Expertise
Not surprisingly, we usually experience our largest surges of demand immediately after hurricanes or other disasters hit, including many requests that are extremely time-critical.
Thankfully we have a head start on filling these requests thanks to a database of companies who have already let us know that they might be willing to help. Each of these companies has made what we at ALAN call a “pre-offer” – a quick notification of the kind of service, product or piece of equipment they might be willing to donate.
We find such pre-offers to be enormously helpful, because (spoiler alert) we’re able to reach survivors more quickly if we already know who’s amenable to providing logistics assistance.
And when every second counts during crisis response, knowing who to contact makes a world of difference.
So if you’re an organization who’d be willing to help with logistics relief efforts, let us know by pre-registering on our website. That way, your offer is in our system and if we receive a future request that matches your offer, we can reach out to confirm that your offer still stands. (By the way, it’s important to point out that your pre-offer isn’t a commitment. It’s simply your way of letting us know we can call on you if one of our cases matches your specialty.) Because without the invaluable network of industry partners we’ve constructed, our work wouldn’t be possible.
Don’t think your company’s services are the right fit? An equally impactful way to help disaster relief efforts is to…
Make A Financial Donation
Every $1 you donate to ALAN enables us to provide $72 worth of humanitarian aid. Now multiply that by five, by ten, by one hundred or by a thousand (and counting…), well, you get the picture.
Every dollar goes a long way in allowing us to deliver the right aid, at the right time, in the right quantities to those who need it most.
It might not feel as dynamic as gifting a forklift or transporting medical equipment. But your donation is what keeps ALAN’s operations in motion – and allows us to activate at a moment’s notice.
Please consider making a financial gift to us today. And spread the message to your colleagues.
P.S. You can learn more about our sponsorship levels by visiting our sponsor page. And don’t forget to…
Check Our Disaster Micro-Site Frequently For Updates
Whether it’s Hurricane Season or just an ordinary day, ALAN receives many requests for assistance that the companies in our pre-offer database aren’t able to help us fulfill.
We post these requests as well as links to further details about them on our Disaster Micro-site, which we encourage you to bookmark and visit frequently.
Even if you don’t see a case that your organization is a good fit for on your first visit, keep on stopping by, because chances are good that we will have a case you can help us with in the future.
Just as important, if you see a posted case that you think one of your connections might be able to help with, feel free to pass the information along to them. If your contribution is passing along critical information to a business that can provide donated goods or services, you’ve still done your part in helping deliver aid to disaster survivors.
Thanks for reading. More importantly, thank you for being willing to help hurricane survivors. If you haven’t read the first two installments of our Hurricane Season Preparedness blog series, we encourage you to do so now. These earlier pieces advise ways to stay safe and stay informed ahead of Hurricane Season. While each and every one of us has a role to play in disaster recovery, we cannot do so without first ensuring our own security.
Tune in next week for the fourth and final installment of our Hurricane Preparedness blog series. And feel free to contact us if you have any questions.
The ALAN Team
