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Housing Works provides housing, food, social support, drug treatment, health care, job training, employment and advocacy and many other services for homeless New Yorkers living with HIV and AIDS. It raises funds in part through its seven upscale thrift stores in Manhattan and Brooklyn and its Used Bookstore Cafe. Housing Works launched online auctions in September 2005 to auction showcase items from its thrift stores (http://www.housingworksauctions.com). It has raised almost $2 million online to date.
I interviewed Housing Works' Director of Business Marketing Keith Mancuso via email to discuss the non-profit organization's expansion into online auctions.
AuctionBytes: Did Housing Works develop the auction software/process in-house, hire someone, or use a third-party system?
Housing Works: I was hired back in 2004 to get the auctions up and running. At first we had planned this package software called emaze, but it really wasn't working the way we wanted, so using emaze as our model, I developed the custom solution we use today. It's evolved quite a bit over the years and I am always working on a new update. Eventually we'd love to be able to license our software out for other non-profits to use but we have quite a bit of work to do before that becomes possible.
AuctionBytes: Who should donate to Housing Works?
Housing Works: Everyone. We pride ourselves on having a wide variety of product of all styles and price levels.
AuctionBytes: Where can Housing Works' online auction items be found in your thrift stores?
Housing Works: Most items are located in the store windows of each of our seven stores. Our smaller stores, namely Brooklyn Heights and the West Village, have display cases with the items inside the store. We are starting to feature more items than we can fit into our windows so sometimes you will see an item online that says it's not on display, but over 90% of the items are.
AuctionBytes: How do you promote your auctions?
Housing Works: We have a grant from Google which provides us with free advertising in their search results, providing us with a lot of our traffic. We also post auction items up on Craigslist and other classified sites to help get the word out. We are working on developing partnerships with publications like Time-Out New York and Apartment Therapy where we are featured regularly.
AuctionBytes: Does Housing works plan on taking advantage of Google Checkout for Non-Profits?
Housing Works: Most definitely... We already use Google Checkout to handle all our credit card processing, and now it means we get all our processing fees waived...we couldn't be more excited!
AuctionBytes: What is the most memorable item that was sold?
Housing Works: Well for me it would have to be a leather bound book of prints (http://www.housingworksauctions.com/lot.cfm?lotID=13857). I remember when my assistant at the time and I discovered it we couldn't believe what we had found. We were so scared that it wouldn't sell for what we thought it was worth that we actually locked it in a safe for more then a year. When we finally got up the nerve to list it online, it ended up selling for just under $5K, not the million dollars we hoped for, but definitely a great price.
AuctionBytes: Why have you chosen to use your own venue instead of eBay and/or eBay MissionFish?
Housing Works: We love eBay but we feel that it's easy to get lost in a sea of junk on eBay. We wanted to create an online experience that was much closer to the shopping experience in our stores then eBay could provide. When you go into a thrift store you don't normally know what you're going to leave with, you go into to browse, look around, find something that jumps out at you.
eBay, because of the sheer volume of merchandise, doesn't lend itself to this browsing experience. Our site allows people not only to view items in specific categories, but also encourages them to browse a window display, we find that this method of shopping works well for our customers as they often find things they didn't even know they were looking for.
We also wanted a site that would not only bring in revenue but also promotes our mission, and encourage people to get involved not just by shopping but by volunteering and donating as well. Customers can fill out requests for furniture pickups, get store location information and even sign up to volunteer at their favorite location. I think for other non-profits, MissionFish is a great idea, but because we encourage our customers to donate their items instead of selling them themselves, we don't really promote it.
AuctionBytes: Are donors informed of closing sale price - for tax or other purposes?
Housing Works: Unfortunately we don't have the tracking system in place to track items from donations to sale, either online or in our stores. Donors are encouraged to provide what they believe to be the items' "fair market value" and they use this value for tax purposes.
AuctionBytes: How are the items appraised?
Housing Works: We don't normally professionally appraise our items, unless we really feel them to be exceptional. We have a few antique dealers who are friends of the agency that will help us our with these items. We feel that the auction process really provides us with the best possible valuation of the items, items might start at $25 and go up to $10,000.
AuctionBytes: Housing Works appears to be more selective than Goodwill Auctions...I assume that Housing Works exclusively auctions "showcase items" whereas Goodwill offers mid-tier items (as well as showcase or luxury items)?
Housing Works: I think a lot of this goes back to my comments about eBay... Goodwill's auctions are much closer to eBay than ours, they list thousands of items from all over the country and you really have to have a good idea of what you're looking for if you're going to find anything on there. Our philosophy is quality not quantity. This doesn't mean we only sell really expensive items on our site, on the contrary items start as low as $2 and sometimes only sell for about $10, but all the items on our site were chosen for a reason, that reason isn't only its price. We also are local so we can offer things eBay and Goodwill have trouble with like furniture much easier, and New Yorkers can feel good about shopping with us because they will know that the money they spend will go to helping their fellow New Yorkers.
AuctionBytes: Did you hear that Goodwill is opening up Brick and Mortar Bookstores? Housing Works has had a bookstore in Manhattan for quite a few years...Do you have any advice for Goodwill entering this arena?
Housing Works: Running a bookstore is a very difficult business and I would honestly advise against anyone trying to set something like that up nowadays. Our Housing Works Bookstore Cafe is great but we are at the point were we make as much selling books online as we do selling books in the actual store, and it won't be long before the scales have completely tipped. The way we keep our bookstore alive is by treating it as more than just a bookstore, it's a cultural center. We hold readings, concerts and parties in the space all the time, and we have a popular cafe in the back with free WiFi. These features keep people coming back to us, the regular customer is extremely important to the bookstore business.
Additional Links:
http://www.housingworks.org
http://www.housingworksauctions.com
http://www.housingworks.org/usedbookcafe
http://www.shopgoodwill.org
http://www.goodwillbooks.com
http://stores.ebay.com/Goodwill-Books
http://weberbooks.com/selling/2007/09/goodwill-opening-bookstores-to-sell-its.html
http://www.missionfish.org
http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y07/m09/i28/s04
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