Bottomless Closet

At Bottomless Closet our mission is to inspire and guide disadvantaged New York City women to enter the workforce and achieve success. We achieve this through the provision of career-appropriate clothing, resume help and interview skills, as well as access to a series of Financial Management, Professional Development and Personal Enrichment workshops aimed at achieving self-sufficiency.

To date, we have supported over 46,000 women in their effort to lift themselves out of poverty. In 2019, we held over 3,500 1:1 client interactions and worked directly with over 2,200 individual women while providing 100 workshops. Nearly 100% of clients identify Bottomless Closet as the key factor in their success.

Bottomless Closet clients are all low-income New York City women, referred by over 150 agencies throughout the city. When a client first comes to Bottomless Closet, she will have an interview set up and a basic resume but she will not be well equipped to succeed. For the next 90 minutes, she will work 1:1 with her Career Coach who will help her select the perfect interview outfit in our on-site boutique, refine her resume and practice a mock interview. By the time she leaves, each woman is not just an applicant, but a candidate for a job.

Once she secures the job, a client has the opportunity to return for a Post-Hire appointment geared around building out her career wardrobe and setting her up for success on those important early days of her new job. All clients have access to ongoing training through our broad workshop curriculum which incorporates courses on Financial Management, Professional Development and Personal Enrichment, all designed to promote self-sufficiency.

Over the past 2 decades, Bottomless Closet has experienced steady, carefully planned growth in its administration, financing, and programs. Originally a fully volunteer-run operation, under the leadership of Melissa Norden, the organization now functions with 12 paid staff in addition to 200+ volunteers and an active Emerging Leaders network. Bottomless Closet is governed by an 18 member Board of Directors and has an operating budget of $1.8M

Our experience since 1999 has enabled us to develop, test and refine program delivery and content to best support our clients’ needs. Many of our clients’ lives have been affected by issues like homelessness, domestic violence or even incarceration, and our expertise in working with this population is central to our volunteer and staff training as well as our programming. As the job market continues to evolve, our experience, leadership and capabilities set us apart in our ability to support New York City women achieve success in the workforce.

To date, we have worked with over 46,000 New York City women in their effort to lift themselves out of poverty and build self-sufficient lives for themselves and their families. In 2019 alone, we held over 3,500 1:1 client interactions and worked directly with over 2,200 individual women while providing 53 workshops.

Nearly 100% of clients identify Bottomless Closet as the core factor to their success. Beyond just the direct impact on these women, we hear every day from our returning clients how the changes they have made in their lives are having a positive ripple effect on their families and communities as well.