This is a story about tempered glass, but not really. This is really a story about a remarkable woman, Iris Wallace of Glaser Glass. It’s also a story about the power of giving.
Where to begin?
We opened our thrift store in Acushnet to help offset our programming and overhead expenses. We sell adult clothes and small home goods – things that are donated to us, but that cannot be re-purposed for children. The new store is open on Saturdays (only) and is doing well, primarily because we have terrific volunteer managers running it and the quantity, quality and pricing of the goods is unbelievable.
We secured terrific racking for the clothes from a defunct business in Plymouth and with the help of a local donor we bought new, chromed wire shelving for our home goods department. We then learned, the hard way, that all our brick-a-brac and small items won’t sit right on a wire shelf.
We priced glass shelves and they turned out to be way too expensive for us to justify purchasing and we came up with a plan B, to use a plastic sheet, cut to fit the shelves, which works but not really – lots of items stick and the thin plastic is not very stable.
So, here is where our story takes a turn towards the wonderful!
Three weeks ago we received a call from Iris Wallace at Glaser Glass in New Bedford, who asked if we could use some glass that was surplus at the museum, it was in large sheets, but it was not tempered and was the wrong size for shelves. On the face of it – a lovely thought but the glass would need to be cut and tempered and in the real world that’s just too complicated, time consuming and not profitable. But then Iris Wallace kicked in – and wham – perfectly cut and tampered glass shelving showed up at our door-step. When we thanked Iris for this tremendous act of kindness she totally deferred – this is what she told us: “I am glad you are pleased and the glass will help with operations. I showed Kevin Souza the email you sent. He was pivotal in getting this job accomplished and with a smile! I am very lucky to have him. It took a group of people working together to get this accomplished. Dana Costa, Dana is a subcontractor who works for the Whaling Museum. He called me regarding the glass they wanted to dispose of. In addition, he brought all the sheets of glass here to us.
Then there is Christina Connett, Curator of Collections and Exhibits for the Whaling Museum. Christina runs the operations who gave us the no longer needed glass. Then Ann Oliveira from Thermal Seal Insulating Glass in Uxbridge and Joshua Foster of WGM Fabricators at Woonsocket Glass & Mirror. Ann and Josh run the tempering facilities. Their staff picked up the shelves, brought them back to be tempered, and returned them to us on their trucks- All with no charge! The tempering ovens are large furnaces which temper the glass, changing it to safety material from regular plate glass. It is gratifying to see people working together to get a project accomplished! – Iris”
Jim Stevens, our CEO had this to say – “To have over a dozen local business people who already have have a ton of stuff to do, go out of their way to get us perfectly sized, tempered glass shelving for our new thrift store is like magic!
It’s also about Dana and Iris and Kevin and Christina and Ann and Joshua and some others not named that did the work of a specific act of kindness and giving. For us these fine people are truly bright and shining lights!
Come and visit our thrift store (9-2 on Saturdays) and see the magical tempered glass shelving for yourself!”