We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Traci Allen. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Traci below.
Traci, appreciate you joining us today. How did you come up with the idea for your business?
I was raised to help people. I witnessed my mother help her church, friends, family, and strangers…anyone!! It’s seriously in my genes and I have a legacy to uphold. So I run this nonprofit with pride and I aim to do as my mother did; help people. So at Bernice’s Room, we partner with other organizations, agencies, churches, clinics, and others to help their clients with new clothes, shoes, resume/job assistance, HIV support, food, and/or connecting to other community resources, We try to help anyone that may just need a little extra help. We also do community fairs and free giveaways. Which we will be doing more often with our new location.
Traci, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I myself am a single mother of a beautiful, 7 year old son. I became a nurse 15 years ago because I love helping people. I realized one day, I wanted to make a difference outside of nursing and help my community more. I wanted to put items in the homeless males hands or give that single, struggling mother clothes for her interview. So, I started giving out hygiene bags and used clothes that I collected from friends and neighbors to people downtown and in “tent cities”. From there, I went bigger and officially started a nonprofit organization. In almost a year and a half, we have grown from my garage to a physical location on the east side of San Antonio. We expanded services and have big plans for the future. We have very dedicated volunteers and have done great things in a short amount of time for our community.
Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?
Social media is a huge factor for non-profits and with for-profit businesses. A lot of my partners and contracts were because someone saw my TikTok video or a Facebook post. Never underestimate the power of social media. It is time-consuming but keep posting…it will pay off.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
Funny, people think that because I am running a non-profit organization that it is less stressful than running a business that makes revenue. Quite the opposite. I work just as hard, if not harder for my clientele and my organization. It is not easy to get funding to continue to help people and grow your organization. I stepped down from a full time, nursing supervisor role to pursue my goals. So failure is not an option.
Contact Info:
- Website: Bernicesroom.org
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bernicesroom/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bernicesroom/