On January 9, 2018, Lumbermen Associates, a wholesale building products distributor based in Bristol, Pennsylvania, held its 20th annual Shed and Gazebo Builders Breakfast in Blue Ball, Pennsylvania. More than 60 shed building companies attended. The distributor had served the outdoor storage industry for over 30 years, and the breakfast had become a fixture on the builders’ calendar.
The 2018 event carried a personal note. Amie Lapp, founder of Lapp’s Structures in New Holland, Pennsylvania, died the previous year after a fight with cancer. Lapp had spent much of his working life organizing the Haiti Benefit Auction of Pennsylvania, an Anabaptist community charity that raises funds and implements projects in Haiti. In his memory, Lumbermen Associates donated $25 for each truckload of material sold to the charity, and Ken Martin, chairman of the charity’s board of directors, attended to outline the projects the funds support and accept the donation.
That formula, a set amount per unit of business, is one of the cleanest giving models in the industry. Organizers who run events like this study the benefit challenges of every dollar the way planners evaluate any investment, and the model keeps working because the math is easy to explain and easy to trust.
How Benefit Auctions Fund Real Projects
A benefit auction works like any auction with one difference: the proceeds go to a cause. Builders donate buildings, materials, or labor. Attendees bid. The charity converts the winning bids into projects, and the whole cycle runs on trust between the people who give and the people who build.
The Haiti Benefit Auction of Pennsylvania has run this cycle for years, organized by volunteers and supported by builders across four states. The charity’s focus is practical: housing, clean water, and tools that let people build their own futures. Donors see receipts, project updates, and the faces of the people the money helps.
| Giving Method | How It Works | Example | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cash donation | Direct transfer to the charity | Year-end gift | Simple, immediate impact |
| Per-unit donation | Fixed amount per sale | $25 per truckload | Builders with steady volume |
| Auction items | Goods bid on by attendees | A donated shed or gazebo | Events with an audience |
| Material overstock | Surplus lumber or hardware | End-of-project leftovers | Cutting waste while giving |
| Volunteer labor | Crew hours on a project | Framing a charity build | Hands-on companies |
The per-unit model deserves attention because it scales with the business. A builder who sells ten truckloads in a month gives $250 without touching the monthly budget, and the number is easy to announce, track, and verify. It also grows naturally: a good year for the company is a good year for the charity.
The giving decision itself mirrors a buying decision. A family weighs the same trade-offs when deciding whether to buy a land-home package or hire a builder for a new house: compare the options, check the costs, and commit. Charity committees should do the same homework.
Why Builders Give Back to Their Communities
The donation at the 2018 breakfast was personal. Dean Fry, a salesman at Lumbermen Associates, had known Amie Lapp for over 27 years as a loyal customer and a friend. “I could think of no better way than to contribute to the Haiti charity that was so important to him,” Fry said at the event.
That kind of loyalty runs through the shed industry. Builders know their customers by name, their suppliers by handshake, and their communities by the projects they have built in them. Giving back is not a marketing department decision. It is how the industry already operates, formalized into an event.
The most successful operators understand that being a savvy builder means more than framing straight walls and pricing jobs right. It means showing up for the town that buys from you, and doing it consistently enough that people count on it.
The Loyalty Dividend
Companies that give consistently report that customers remember the contribution long after they forget the discount. The goodwill converts into referrals, repeat orders, and a reputation that survives the occasional bad review. A supplier who sponsors a charity breakfast gets called first when a builder needs a rush delivery.
Legacy Beyond the Shop
Amie Lapp organized auctions in four states and built a charity that outlived him. For small-business owners who put their names on the company sign, that is a reminder that the business is part of a longer story than any single fiscal year. The buildings disappear into backyards, but the reputation for generosity stays in the community.
Organizing a Charity Event Around Your Business
Any builder can host a version of the builders breakfast. The event does not need a big budget. It needs a clear purpose and a formula that everyone can understand, and it needs a date that lands on the calendar every year so people plan around it.
- Choose a cause that matters to your customers and your crew.
- Find a charity with a track record and ask what it needs most.
- Pick an event format: breakfast, auction, job-site open house, or golf outing.
- Set a donation formula tied to something you can count, such as per truckload, per sale, or per attendee.
- Invite customers, competitors, and suppliers. A charity event is one place competitors sit at the same table.
- Announce the total afterward, with a note on where the money went.
Events also carry builder obligations: honor every promised donation, keep clear financial records, and tell donors exactly how the money was used. The discipline is the same one a contractor applies to warranty work on a new home, where the paperwork matters as much as the repair.
Working With a Charity Partner
A good partner brings structure: receipts, project updates, and a contact person who can speak to the charity’s work. Ken Martin did exactly that at the 2018 breakfast, outlining the projects the Haiti Benefit Auction supports and accepting the donation in person. That face-to-face moment turned a check into a story that attendees repeated for weeks.
Material Donations and Inventory Management
Surplus material is a hidden giving resource. Every job leaves behind partial bundles of lumber, half-used rolls of house wrap, extra fasteners, and cut-offs that are too good to throw away and too awkward to store.
A material donation policy turns that overstock into community value. Some builders donate directly to charities. Others hold the material for auction items at benefit events. Either way, the material leaves the yard useful instead of ending up in a landfill, and the yard gains back floor space.
Treating donations as part of material management, rather than as an afterthought, also trims disposal costs and keeps the inventory count honest. A yard that moves surplus out the door has an easier time tracking what is actually available to sell.
Paperwork matters. A receipt with the material’s fair market value lets the charity acknowledge the gift and lets the business document it. The rules vary by jurisdiction, so a quick conversation with an accountant before the first donation saves surprises at tax time.
Measuring the Return on Community Involvement
Giving back does not have to be a leap of faith. The businesses that give year after year track what comes back, and the numbers are usually good. The returns show up in places that are hard to buy with advertising.
- Leads from the event: attendees who later ask for a quote.
- Retention: customers who mention the donation when they reorder.
- Employee pride: crew members who volunteer and stay longer.
- Press and social proof: coverage that no ad budget can match.
The comparison is a decision like any other, and making the right choice for your company means weighing the event’s costs against its returns just as carefully as you would weigh any marketing spend. A breakfast costs a morning and a few dozen plates of eggs. A year of goodwill costs the same and returns more.
One caution: giving that strains cash flow helps no one. The per-unit model works precisely because it is small enough to sustain and large enough to matter. Start with a number that hurts nothing, and raise it when the business grows.
Keeping the Business Strong While Giving Back
A fundraiser cannot help a community if it damages the business that sponsored it. The companies that give for decades keep the basics in place: healthy margins, current insurance, and a giving plan that survives slow years.
Any event that involves construction activity should carry builder risk coverage or event liability, because a single claim can erase years of goodwill. Volunteer builds need workers compensation protection for everyone on the site, whether they are paid crew or weekend volunteers.
The model Lumbermen Associates demonstrated is portable. Pick a cause, tie the gift to a unit you can count, invite the whole industry, and report the result. The shed business did it for 20 years, and the builders who attend keep coming back because the breakfast gives them something money cannot buy: a reason to feel good about the trade they chose.