Questions about Habitat for Humanity, answered in the words of the people who did the work. The engagement itself is on its own page.
What did a piece of the bid work, labor or consulting let a chapter do that materials alone could not?
Habitat for Humanity of Orange County is the chapter we were most involved with, and our consulting was about being more selective with the materials they took on. Contractors had started using Habitat as free demolition. They would offer a kitchen full of cabinets, Habitat would come out, take them down and save everything, then find out they were worthless, because cheap cabinets come down poorly and can never be installed again. The general contractor saved on the trash load, and Habitat hauled it to the dump anyway. Being selective kept their crews and trucks off material nobody could use.
What scale did the stricter intake practice reach?
It is tough for us to put a number on it. We did not have access to their books, so we could not see what they actually saved in pickups, hauling or disposal. What we can tell you is what happened to the practice. Habitat for Humanity across Southern California adopted it as standard. It is almost a joke now how selective they got. They do not just take anything anymore. That is the scale we can speak to: it became the way the region handles donations. We know the savings were large, but we will not guess at a figure.
How did chapter leaders come to trust the stricter intake approach?
We started with a promise: we are only going to send you good stuff. Then we took them on site, in Orange County, and showed them what to look for and what to turn away. They were taking in a lot of junk. Home Depot grade cabinets that cannot be installed, old fixtures nobody has the valves for. We showed them what happens when you try to reuse that. After that they built their own two lists, what is okay to take and what is not, and the lists became how intake worked.