Many organizations need to help veterans, however not all help addresses actual wants. How can one thing as sensible as transferring and storage help make a distinction?
A brand new partnership between PODS, primarily based in Clearwater, FL, and Tampa Bay nonprofit Operation Therapeutic Forces launched this 12 months. PODS now serves as OHF’s unique transferring and storage supplier. They donate containers and storage help to assist wounded and injured Particular Operations service members and their households navigate relocations throughout restoration, which helps scale back stress. PODS has a permanent historical past and dedication to supporting army members and their households.
Beneath, we communicate with Irfan Bojadzija, Vice President of Residential and Business Partnerships at PODS Shifting & Storage, and Kerry Irvin, CEO at Operation Therapeutic Forces to speak about this new partnership and the large distinction they’re making for Particular Operations households.
Navy.com (Kimberly O’Brien): Operation Therapeutic Forces works with Particular Operations households throughout a number of the most tough moments of their lives. From the partnership perspective, how can eradicating on a regular basis logistical stress, like transferring or momentary housing, change the restoration expertise for these households?
Irfan Bojadzija (Vice President of Residential and Business Partnerships, PODS) and Kerry Irvin (CEO, Operation Therapeutic Forces): For Particular Operations households navigating restoration, rehabilitation, or reintegration, even easy duties can turn into overwhelming. When a service member is therapeutic, the whole household is adjusting alongside them. One thing as sensible as transferring or securing momentary storage can rapidly turn into an added burden throughout an already complicated time. The partnership between PODS and Operation Therapeutic Forces (OHF) immediately alleviates this stress by offering transferring and storage help throughout transitions that always coincide with restoration wants. By eradicating these logistical pressures, households acquire stability. That stability permits them to give attention to medical care, connection, and rebuilding routines at house. Lowering exterior stress creates the circumstances for significant restoration.
Navy.com: Many individuals consider restoration from fight accidents as primarily medical. Elements like stability at house, household help, and lowered day-to-day stress form the long-term restoration and reintegration of Particular Operations service members. How will this new partnership tackle lesser-known logistical challenges wounded Particular Operations service members and their households face?
Bojadzija & Irvin: Medical care is vital, however it’s only one a part of the restoration journey. True therapeutic is influenced by the surroundings a service member returns to. It’s formed by whether or not the house feels safe, whether or not the household feels supported, and whether or not pointless stress has been lowered. This partnership immediately targets the “behind the scenes” challenges that always disrupt progress, akin to fast relocations, prolonged remedy stays, or transitions that require momentary housing and storage options.
As OHF’s unique transferring and storage supplier, PODS supplies containers to help these wants, offering households reduction from usually time-consuming logistics and securing momentary storage or transferring wants throughout restoration. By offering sensible transferring and storage help by way of OHF’s SOAR program, households acquire flexibility and respiration room throughout moments that may in any other case really feel overwhelming. When stability will increase, restoration outcomes enhance. Households can stay centered on rehabilitation, reintegration, and rebuilding connections moderately than managing logistics alone.
Navy.com: How might partnerships like this affect optimistic outcomes and alter the way in which future restoration help is delivered? Is there the rest you wish to share?
Bojadzija & Irvin: Partnerships that mix nonprofit mission with private-sector capabilities set a brand new commonplace for what holistic restoration help can seem like. When organizations acknowledge that sensible help is simply as necessary as scientific care, the restoration mannequin turns into extra full.
The PODS and OHF partnership demonstrates how aligning assets, like OHF’s year-round reintegration and resilience packages and PODS’ nationwide transferring and storage providers, helps create a seamless help system for households who usually function below very excessive stress and uncertainty.
Partnerships like this are very important to fulfilling OHF’s mission of restoring energy and stability to the army neighborhood. By integrating logistical help immediately into the restoration journey, we will think about the total image of what households want: medical entry, emotional help, and the sensible stability that frees them to give attention to the following step of their therapeutic journey.
What makes this partnership particular will not be solely the service it supplies, however the shared values behind it. Each PODS and Operation Therapeutic Forces have deep roots within the Tampa Bay, Florida, army neighborhood and a long-standing dedication to honoring those that serve.
In 2025 alone, PODS offered almost 33,000 containers for army strikes and providers roughly 279 army installations throughout the continental U.S. and Hawaii.
Final 12 months, PODS introduced its participation within the MILITARY STAR® card community, powered by Uncover® World Community, which makes it simpler for army members and their households to entry PODS’ versatile transferring and storage providers by way of a monetary instrument designed particularly for the army neighborhood.
OHF is proud to welcome PODS as a trusted companion, and the corporate’s generosity permits OHF to proceed restoring energy and stability to Particular Operations households in significant, tangible methods.
For the total press launch, see PODS® Companions with Operation Therapeutic Forces to Assist America’s Particular Operations Neighborhood.
