Happy Brag Day

It’s almost Flag Day here in the United States.  But until then, all of us at ALAN are busy celebrating another important holiday that we like to call Brag Day.  (And in case you’re wondering, yes, we did invent it.  How could you tell?)

It’s a day when we remember some of the many people who selflessly helped ALAN fill a critical need during the previous year’s hurricane season.   Just as important, it’s a time when we stop and send them one more heartfelt thank you before the new hurricane season gets too busy and things here at ALAN get too hectic.

So without further ado, allow us to salute the following individuals and organizations for:

• Peachy-Keen Assistance . . . How can a warehouse in Atlanta help hurricane survivors in the Carolinas?  By agreeing to store and stage 100 pallets’ worth of relief supplies for a national non-profit. Thanks for the donation, HWC Logistics!
• Out-Of-The-Box-Generosity. . . When two non-profits in the Carolinas needed boxes to help collect and sort relief items after Hurricane Florence, Hassett Express and International Paper stepped up with a key donation and delivery.  Muchas gracias to you both.
• An Outstanding Encore Performance . . . In 2017 The Home Depot and Estes Express teamed up to lend flat beds, a box truck and drivers that helped get critical goods delivered to the survivors of Hurricane Irma.  During Hurricane Season 2018, they repeated that donation to help a non-profit deliver more than 300 tons of food, water and cleaning supplies to the Panhandle community. Now that’s what we call positive déjà vu!
• Setting The Stage . . . After a non-profit asked us to find a place near the Carolina coast to stage key rescue equipment, Bonded Logistics didn’t hesitate to offer up its facility 6601 in Charlotte. And we didn’t hesitate to accept.  What else can we say but thank you, thank you, thank you?
• Coming Through For Us Yet Again . . . 24 pallets’ worth of much-needed food and cleaning supplies found their way from Oklahoma City, OK to support disaster relief efforts in Fayetteville, NC thanks to donated transportation services from the UPS Foundation.  And that’s just one of the many moves it’s helped us with over the past year!   Thank you, UPS.  You truly rock.
• Delivering The Goods . . . It’s often tough to find transportation services immediately after a hurricane, which is why we’re especially grateful for the trucking help that SIRVA provided in Raleigh, NC after Hurricane Florence.   Merci beaucoup, SIRVA.  And may we please get permission to clone you?
• Paying It Forward . . . When International Medical Corps needed warehousing space to assist its first responders, it was another non-profit with a nearby distribution center in Kingston, NC, that stepped up to help. Kudos and thanks to Rise Against Hunger for helping ALAN fulfill this important need.
• NOT Listening To Shakespeare . . . One of the most common requests ALAN gets after a disaster is for the short-term loan of industrial equipment – like the powered pallet jacks and forklifts that Saddle Creek, Southworth Products, Hyster-Yale, Ring Power, Gregory Poole and Publix agreed to temporarily loan to several non-profits that were assisting with hurricane relief in fall 2018.  Thank heavens for all of these generous organizations. And are we ever glad they didn’t take the advice “never . . . a lender be” to heart!
• Being So Doggone Helpful. . . They may be called People’s Services. Yet they helped make a lot of animals’ lives much more comfortable when they provided much-needed warehouse space and support for pet food and supplies in North Carolina last fall.  So thank you, People’s.  You really are the cat’s meow.
• “Ad”-ing Value. . . If you happened to notice – or even better yet click on – our Hurricane Relief banner ad, please join us in thanking Mitch MacDonald and the team at Agile Media (DC Velocity and Supply Chain Quarterly) for designing and running it.  In a similar vein, we want to thank our association partners for sending out APBs when we had specific needs we just KNEW their members could fill.  (P.S.? We were right!  Their members came through!)
• Keeping It Real – And Keeping Everyone In The Loop. . . As anyone who works in logistics knows, information is often the most important resource of all.  As a result, we are ever-grateful for organizations like FreightWaves, DHL Resilience 360 and RiskPulse for providing data to help our emergency management and business supply chain professionals understand how Hurricane Florence impacted logistics and supply chain activities.   In addition, allow us to say props to MIT’s Supply Chain Humanitarian Lab and LIFT Non-Profit Logistics for helping us host daily situational awareness calls before, during and after hurricanes Lane and Florence.
• Putting The “I” In Team 🙂 . . . Finally, there were several individuals who put their lives – or jobs – on hold to help us for free with things like social media, web site updates and operational requests after hurricane season 2018 got especially busy. So we would be remiss if we also didn’t thank Robert Runyon and Meg Thornton (and their patient employers Verst Logistics and Saddle Creek Logistics), Leigh Richards, Beverly Jorgenson and Matt Werner for their invaluable contributions.

I’m all out of puns and corny analogies, so I guess this is as fitting a time to close as any.

But before I do, let me leave you with one small final thought – and plant one small seed.

Although all of the stories that I shared here are particular to Hurricane Season 2018, the needs they filled bear a remarkable similarity to the needs and urgent requests that ALAN helps with year after year.  So if you’re making plans for this hurricane season and wondering how you can help, just take a look above.  Then, if you’re feeling particularly generous, go to the “How to Help” portion of ALAN’s web site (https://www.alanaid.org/offer-inkind-services-or-equipment/) and make a pre-offer.  It will help us far more than you can even imagine.

On behalf of all of us at ALAN, we wish you the happiest of Brag Days – and the best of Flag Days, too.

Kathy