Rose Report: Issue 14

RFS Gives Back

Corporate philanthropy offers many benefits, but most importantly it helps the people in the community where you do business. On Friday, August 16th Rose Financial Services delivered 1,350 meals to the homeless—continuing a trend of donating more and more to those in need in their community every year. The first time RFS organized a food drive was in October 2008, when they delivered 150 meals, and the company-wide event has been growing ever since.

Giving back to the community is a large part of RFS’s corporate culture, and every employee gets involved. Twice a year the staff goes shopping for supplies, forms an assembly line at the office to put meals together, and then delivers them to shelters and food banks throughout Maryland. It’s a great team-building activity and keeps office morale high—research shows that employees enjoy working for a company that shares their values.

In addition to increasing employee engagement, corporate volunteering programs are good for a company’s bottom line. According to the Deloitte 2011 Volunteer IMPACT Survey: “The affinity that employees feel toward an employer has the power to create a competitive advantage that can be hard to imitate, and is inextricably linked to organizational performance. Sometimes intangible, its force is undeniable. Without a motivated and engaged workforce, even the most brilliant business strategies can falter.”

Instituting a corporate philanthropy program also creates goodwill throughout the community, improving a company’s brand. A 2010 study called the Consumer Social Responsibility Branding Survey found that 75 percent of consumers who have read about a company’s social responsibility agenda on its website said that it made them more likely to purchase products or services from that company.

RFS delivered meals to Stepping Stones Shelter in Rockville, the Howard County Food Bank, the Middletown Food Bank, the Montgomery County Coalition for the Homeless, Shepherd’s Table in Silver Spring, and Carrol House Men’s Shelter in Silver Spring. Each lunch was stocked with a ham and cheese sandwich, granola bar, apple sauce, cookie, and bottle of water, while breakfasts featured a bagel with cream cheese, granola bar, and apple sauce.

To purchase supplies to make the meals, employees donated $5 to wear jeans on the last Friday of every month. The RFS Gives Back Foundation, was created by Ted Rose in January 2011 to support company-wide philanthropic efforts, also donated to the effort. “It’s important to get our employees involved,” says Marketing Manager Elizabeth Summerville. “We all have a goal that we work towards achieving together.”