Mackenzie Investments

Back in the Workshop, year after year

Since 2011, teams of Mackenzie Investments employees have traded their desks for a day at Furniture Bank, repairing, painting and assembling the furniture that turns an empty apartment into a home.

Mackenzie teams have been coming since 2011, with 12 volunteer groups in the first seven years alone. The visits kept coming. Two groups came in 2018 and four in 2022, and in 2020, in the middle of the pandemic, a team of eight still showed up to help. In 2026, Mackenzie teams were back in April, July and October.

The work changes with what families need. Mackenzie volunteers have reupholstered chairs, painted dressers, and assembled chairs, tables and drawers. They have tested more than 140 donated electronics, so everything that goes into a home works when it gets there. On one July visit the team also sorted more than 70 boxes of donations and helped move three client orders, more than 85 items, on their way to families.

Every finished piece goes onto our showroom floor. Families referred by social service agencies choose what they need there: newcomers and refugees, people leaving homelessness, and women and children starting over after a shelter stay. Since 2023 alone, Mackenzie's Workshop days have helped more than 250 families.

Giving back is part of how Mackenzie Investments works. Through its Mackenzie Gives program, the Canadian asset manager matches employees' donations and volunteer time, and every year its people mark Giving Week with volunteer days and fundraising. Mackenzie has supported Furniture Bank with financial gifts since 2011 as well.

Many Mackenzie days end with a team photo under the Furniture Bank banner, an oversized wrench held high. Behind each one are families who will sit on a chair a Mackenzie volunteer reupholstered and keep their clothes in a dresser a Mackenzie volunteer painted.