Behind the scenes in our warehouse

16 of the In Kind Direct team left behind our spreadsheets and dining room desks to come together for a day in our warehouse. As several new people have joined In Kind Direct over the last year, it was the first in-person meet for many and even with masks on we pretty much recognised everyone in an instant from our virtual meetings. 

We all took covid-19 tests in the morning to check that we were safe to gather together and Janet and Angie – our dynamic logistics duo based in Shropshire – were waiting to welcome us with a glint in their eye.  They had planned out a number of special missions for us, and it was clear they expected us to work hard, no time to slack, with tight deadlines to hit. 

One team repackaged mixed display stands of essential dental products into stackable, shippable catalogue-ready boxes of toothbrushes and toothpaste tubes. Another team sorted through vast cartons of sample trainers donated by Pentland, reuniting lefts with rights and sorting into men’s, women’s and children’s boxes. A third team, singing along to the soundtrack from ‘Frozen’, repackaged a donation from Disney of bracelets and charms. 

All in all, we were able to pick, sort and repackage over 20,000 items, and had the invaluable opportunity to shadow our wonderful warehouse team and follow the end-end processes from receiving donations from the back of trucks through to seeing items being picked and boxes containing your orders leaving with our courier firm.   

More so than ever, it has delighted us to see you ordering all the items we worked on from the catalogue. We just hope you overlook the sloppiness of the packaging tape on some of the internal boxes, those tape dispenser guns are hard to master!