Batayeh and its heads of national procurement, risk management,
people services (human resources), sales and marketing and facili-
ties management.
Early on, the team tapped into its national relationships with
suppliers to secure needed PPE, centralized its procurement and
did an audit of the protective equipment that it had at its sites.
“Many of our sites were using masks and gloves for doing turns,
drywall, painting and those sorts of things,” Batayeh says. “In the
beginning, we wanted to get our arms around what inventory
exists. We saw where there were shortages and moved inventory
around internally. Then we placed orders early.”
AMLI Residential, an apartment owner, developer and manager
based in Chicago, charged its procurement team with securing
products while also checking to ensure they were on the list of
approved products to combat COVID.
“We dug through what was effective in disinfecting versus what
was only optics or a feel-good thing,” says Maria Banks, president
and CEO of AMLI Management Co. “We didn’t want to create a
false sense of safety.”
Beyond cleaners, AMLI secured face masks, booties and other
supplies for its onsite teams when they entered residents’ apart-
ments.
When Wood reopened its leasing offices, it also installed
Plexiglass and rope barriers, like the ones the airlines use. “They
made the walkways well-delineated, and there was separation,”
Halsey says. “We spent a lot of money trying to think through cus-
tomer service and the customer experience.”
Before things reopened, Batayeh says Village Green posted sig-
nage that limited capacity in amenity areas and opened sanitation
stations at each of its properties.
But even stocking the sanitation station could sometimes be
challenging in some areas.
Like many office operators, Dallas-based Lincoln PropertyCo. put hand sanitizer in its lobbies. Typically, companies canrefill the hand sanitizer dispensers by just snapping in a newcartridge when the old one is empty. But those cartridges aren’trefillable. If you can’t find the cartridges, the entire system isuseless.
