About

What We Do, The Big Picture – IRN as Matchmaker
IRN is a matchmaker.  We match usable furnishings with nonprofit organizations that need them to fulfill the organizations’ social, humanitarian, or educational mission.
We obtain furnishings from colleges, K-12 schools, companies, and hospitals that are replacing furniture, renovating, downsizing, closing a facility, or for any other reason have excess furniture in good condition that they need to dispose of.  In 2015 we handled more than 200 projects for about 100 different organizations nationwide, who filled some 500 tractor-trailers and shipping containers with usable furnishings.
On the other side, we work with a growing network of more than 100 nonprofits, ranging from small Habitat for Humanity ReStores and local furniture banks to major international charities such as Food for the Poor and World Vision.  We provide them with the furnishings that are desperately needed in the communities they serve, in the U.S. and around the world.  We assure that the furnishings are packed efficiently, arrive in good condition, and are accompanied by required U.S. or international documentation.

The Institution Recycling Network was started in 1999 to match surplus items that need to be recycled with organizations and people who need them. Every education, commercial, and healthcare organization in the U.S. has surplus furniture and equipment they need to get rid of. Hundreds of millions of people living in poverty or recovering from natural disasters worldwide are in desperate need of the kinds of surplus goods these very organizations are discarding. IRN makes the match and facilitates the distribution of the surplus into the hands of the organizations and people who need it most.
IRN partners with nonprofits who are known to be reputable and effective providers of relief and development assistance, and who are able to use the types of surplus that IRN can provide. The organization has a “wish list” from each of its nonprofit partners of the types and quantities of surplus they can use.
www.IRNSurplus.com