From Office Furniture Dealer
Issue Date: February 10, 2010
MOI staff at their recent Haiti fundraiser. Left to Right: Ti Schulze, Arlington, VA director of sales; David Noel, MOI president, and Khalid Itum, VP-Best Practices, Marketing & Business Developmentcerned about your future.
Business conditions for office furniture dealers may be more challenging today than they’ve been in generations, but that hasn’t lessened the dealer community’s traditional commitment to community involvement and support of deserving causes.
Case in point: Washington D.C.’s MOI, Inc. Like the rest of the country, MOI team members watched in horror as the full impact of last month’s earthquake in Haiti became clear: Over 230,000 killed, as many as one million left homeless and all this in a country that was already one of the poorest on the planet.
For MOI vice president Khalid Itum, the disaster called for a strong and immediate response. Khalid immediately scheduled a phone call with his team and suggested the idea of a special Haiti fundraiser at a prominent D.C. hotel. Just three days later, it happened.
The event, which featured speakers from the National Capitol Chapter of the American Red Cross and other local Haitian support organizations, drew close to 500 attendees from the area’s A&D and commercial real estate communities and raised some $187,000 for disaster relief, reports MOI’s Linsey Jorgenson.
“As we watched events unfold on the island, all of us felt we needed to do something to help and do it quickly,” she explained. “We created an aggressive grassroots marketing campaign using a web site, e-mail blasts and Facebook.
Our clients and business partners responded magnificently. The Hyatt Regency on Capitol Hill also joined the effort by donating ballroom space for the evening. We are incredibly thankful to all of our sponsors who included Vornado, Arent Fox, Barbara Nolan Inc., Skanska, and Jones Lang LaSalle.”
As successful as last month’s event was, it is just the beginning of MOI’s efforts to help, says Jorgenson, and planning is already underway for further fundraising in support of Haiti later this year. professionals, including Lane Office president Gregory F. Burke.
© 2013 All rights reserved · 
