Twice a year, Verlo Mattress closes our Milwaukee-based headquarters and corporate-owned stores to bring our staff together for what we call our “Verlo Family Gathering,” which is a day of training and team building. Spending this time together is always well worth it – but this year, it was even more so.

This month, during the 2015 United Way Campaign and their Season of Caring, we chose to use our Family Gathering day to help people less fortunate by doing what we do best – building mattresses. The Verlo team donated 84 hours to build 12 mattress sets that were donated to Autumn West Safe Haven, a local United Way organization that provides housing and services to people who are homeless and facing mental illness.

All 44 corporate employees participated in building the mattresses – even those of us who normally work in other areas of our company, such as sales, administration and marketing.

“We feel everyone deserves a comfortable night’s sleep,” says Chris Nolte, Verlo’s president and CEO, who also lent a hand in the mattress building. “This was the perfect opportunity for us to use our expertise and help an important cause. “

Afterwards, we all reflected on how we had built something more important than mattresses. We felt like we had helped to build dignity and hope for the people who will be sleeping on them. And we had built on our sense of pride as a company.

“It was awesome to help out people who so desperately need things that most of us take for granted, like a good mattress to sleep on,” offers Josh H., a Comfort Coach. “It’s very gratifying to work for a company that not only cares about their employees, but also gives back to the community!”

As is often the case when volunteering, we felt we had received much more than we gave.

“Seeing all the smiles and the laughter was something I won’t forget,” says Darren B., another Comfort Coach. “It was special how everyone was able to help out a great cause and have fun at the same time.”

This Thanksgiving, our Verlo Family is grateful to have been able to help others in some small way.

Wishing you and your family a very Happy Thanksgiving!

(And may you have a comfortable mattress to retire to after getting sleepy from eating turkey!)