The Compassion Society Project

format_quote The space before the renovation, well, we had two units, this one is 3,400 square foot and the warehouse around 3,900 square foot. So together about 7800 square feet was one big empty space. Now this one was a finished unit because there was another store in here; but the other unit in the warehouse, it was never leased for 30 years. So, there was a lot of work that needed to be done in there. And when we walked in, we just had a vision that we just could visualize ourselves doing things in there. Then we shared that vision with The Bradburn Group. And you see what they’ve done.

The space right now, it’s amazing, because it really serves our purpose, the Bradburn Group came as a reference to us, somebody in the community knew them and recommended that they do good work and really community minded. We got in touch with them and got some competitive quotes. We found that they were willing, and the timelines that we were looking for, that worked with us, and they were really, really flexible. So, it just all fit into place. Our experience with Bradburn, you can imagine, commercial move under a very strict timeline, having to sit on permits from the city, which we now know, and we could write a manual on is not easy. What we were told will take six weeks took three months, not because of Bradburn, but because there were so many processes that the city had. And then in terms of restrictions, it was even more difficult.

But what I would say was the cherry on the icing was they were so flexible, we would come back and reject things because we’d realize, okay, this is what we need, this is what we need. And they just made it work with minimum resources, because we are a charity, we’re not government funded, don’t have a big budget to go about, we could salvage all the materials that we had in this space, and they made it work for us, they were very flexible, accommodating and at the end of the day, it was a pleasure, just the experience of having them to listen to what our vision was, and then materializing that into that. What really impressed me about the Bradburn group was, we’d be stressed out because there were so many dependencies, one would depend on two and two would depend on three. And then because we had those timelines, they really, made it work when we told them, we need to have this done by so and so they will really work with us and make it happen. And if we just came up with something in the middle of something that they were working on, and change the idea, because you know, we had to come up with how we can salvage our resources, they would be very accommodating.

So again, their flexibility, and their solution-oriented results were really, really excellent. Our communication experience amazing, like they have this platform that they put all there, you know, pictures and comments on and even if I was busy and not on site, and at my other all location, at the end of the day, I would just receive this notification that it had come in. And then I could actually see in pictures what had been done. So even if I’ve had a long day and did not have time to pop in to see how the site looked like I would have that opportunity to see it digitally off site, the work that they had accomplished that that day. So, it was really a pleasure to have that opportunity.

Our favorite part of the space is our volunteer break room and our little special programs here at the front because, we struggled to have a nice corner for our amazing volunteers to sit down, close the door and just have a little chat and take a break. So now we actually have a dedicated space for that. And then there’s a little program area at the front in the warehouse where folks can come in and you’ll be set up for 10 different programs a year and they can pick out gifts. So, in the warehouse, that’s my personal favorite section and here I love the fact that you know I have an office that I could close the door and you know sit down and have a conversation with a patron or a family that has a need a little bit of privacy. So that’s an amazing reality now.