Basement Makeover with Tanna Clark

This post was written by Tanna Clark of Complete Organizing Solutions

As a professional organizer I can honestly say I have found my dream job! I love working with my clients and seeing their faces light up after a job well done. When I started my organizing business I knew right away I also wanted to be able to use my skills to give back to the community. I recently contacted the local Pregnancy Care Center to offer my services as they were just opening in my town.The director contacted me and told me about their basement and could use my help deciding how to best use the space. 

The director wanted to essentially be able to turn this basement into a huge maternity and baby closet where they could hang maternity clothes, baby clothes, and store all the other necessities a new baby and mother might need. After looking at the basement customizable shelves immediately came to mind and lots of totes! 

I had previously met Jim Deitzel of Rubbermaid through Twitter so I contacted him and told him I thought the Rubbermaid Configurations Closet Kits would meet our needs. I asked him if he could pass a discount on to me since I was a member of The National Association of Professional Organizers with whom Rubbermaid is also affiliated. Rubbermaid went above and beyond and supplied us with all of the shelving and totes that we needed for free! 

We hung all the baby clothes by size, we have shelves for diapers and totes for everything from bibs to pacifiers! The shelving is so useful because it can be rearranged to meet the needs of the center as it grows. Having so much storage on the walls frees up the floor space for freestanding shelves in the future. Each time I came back to the Center more donations kept rolling in. This system will definitely come to good use. We also had left over shelves and a few other components so we bought an additional hanging piece and were able to get a little more wall hanging space out of the materials we had. 

Since working on this project the Pregnancy Care Center had an inch or so of water that had come into the basement. Luckily everything was up on shelves and in plastic totes so there was no water damage to the items that were already donated. Three cheers for Rubbermaid!

It was a huge blessing for all involved in this project. I learned so much and got to help out a wonderful non-profit organization and the new mommy's and babies they continue to help. Thank you Rubbermaid for your generosity!