TACOMA, Wash. (PRWEB)
February 18, 2020
Relief Bed International was founded in 2015 by Scott Smalling who has dedicated his 30 year career to increasing his knowledge of, and improvement to, specialty foams and bedding. Scott’s grandfather Ralph Smalling started their families foam business in 1946 which is still going strong today and on the eve of celebrating its 75th year in business.
Prior to starting Relief Bed International Smalling was President of the families foam business called IR Specialty Foam located in Tacoma, WA. In 2003 he founded the mattress brand ComforPedic® which he ultimately sold to Simmons Bedding Company in 2007. After the sale Smalling spent 8 years with Simmons as their President of Specialty Bedding, and Chief of Specialty Innovations. While at Simmons Smalling helped create and lead numerous road shows to introduce new products. Along the way he curated many philanthropic projects to support Tornado victims in the SE and Fire Station makeovers to name a few. These projects were the catalyst where Smalling fell in love with helping those that didn’t have a good place to sleep.
In 2015, Smalling started Relief Bed International with a goal to donate or significantly subsidize bedding in support of homelessness in United States or disaster relief efforts worldwide. To date Relief Bed has donated/distributed more than 15,000 beds worldwide with a goal to hit 20,000 beds by the end of 2020.
“This has been a fantastic journey and a labor of love, stated an enthusiastic Smalling. My biggest joy is that my son Hunter Smalling and Father Jay Smalling, now 82, have been working with me side by side. In fact, its been a family affair with my wife Carolyn, daughter Sharky and mother Peachy helping along the way. Hunter continues to carry the torch for Relief Bed even while he is at school in Southern California, continued Smalling.
Relief Bed International has had numerous private and corporate partners over its first 5 years. Most recently, their largest partner has been Brentwood Home headquartered out of Southern California who supports Relief Bed by donating funds for every mattress they sell through their Crystal Cove Mattress line of beds. http://www.brentwoodhome.com Other corporate partners have included; Ergomotion®, Reverie®, Chili Pad®, Levitz Mattress, Mattress Direct, PURPLE®, SHEEX and many others.
“It has been very rewarding knowing we have provided hundreds of beds to those in need through our partnership with Relief Bed, Stated Brian Baxter VP of Business Development for Brentwood Home.
Over the past 5 years Smalling and team have traveled to Haiti with World Concern, curated an awareness tour in support of homelessness that took them on a 7 state, 5,000 mile tour over 3 months donating beds to homeless shelters along the way and taking part in local events educating people on homelessness.
“Its relatively easy for our partners to join with us in support of disaster relief, but it’s a struggle, at times, to get folks to understand our passion for homelessness. While one of the largest contributors to homelessness stems from a struggle with drug abuse we like to look past this and see these souls through a lens of love as Christ would,” stated Smalling. All of these souls have a story and a journey that would shock, surprise and soften the hearts of those who assume homelessness is just an epidemic of laziness and/or drug abuse. I have had the good fortune to sit with many of these friends and hear their story, continued Smalling.
Smalling likes to include a verse in his email salutation which is meant to remind and inspire all who he communicates with to use your learned life talents / gifts to serve others. 1 Peter 4:10.
Relief Bed International is a 501(c)3 non-profit and encourages donations through their website http://www.reliefbed.com/donate Corporate partners who want to create their own Giving Program are asked to reach out to Scott via his email; scott@reliefbed.com or call 253-312-0653.
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