The Shoreline Project for Street

BY Steve James; Heather Skinner
ABSTRACT
Abstract
The nonprofit sector is increasingly faced with the challenges of adopting unfamiliar
orientations focusing on customer service and quality which historically have been more
usually associated with the commercial for-profit sector. Such organizations are also
facing financial and competitive pressures which are also more commonly associated
with the commercial world and market economies. These factors tend to imply that
nonprofit organizations should adopt a market orientation. Indeed many initiatives
offered by public and nonprofit organizations are now defined as “social marketing.”
This article presents empirical evidence from a case study of an innovative supportedhousing
project for homeless street drinkers and considers the barriers faced when
implementing the project. Issues surrounding top management leadership, service
design, service quality, consumer engagement, and the engagement of frontline
customers facing service delivery personnel are considered, as these would expect to be
evident in a service organization with a strong market orientation. However, considering
that the project was implemented contrary to the express wishes of both the
organization's internal market of its service employees and the primary target market of
its service users, conclusions are drawn within a conceptual framework that agrees with
the need to consider a social rather than a market orientation to the provision of such
services within nonprofit organizations.

Social Marketing Quarterly: 15(3) Fall 2009
www.socialmarketingquarterly.com
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