Case Study: American Red Cross staffs volunteers 50% faster with Twilio

The Red Cross Streamlines Volunteer Dispatch With Twilio

The American Red Cross of Chicago & Northern Illinois responds to roughly 3–4 disasters a day (about 1,200 a year), mostly house fires that require immediate volunteer deployment. Their old dispatch process relied on individual phone calls to confirm availability and status, wasting critical time and often favoring experienced responders over newcomers.

They adopted DCSOps, an open-source incident management system that integrates Twilio SMS to send one broadcast message to volunteers and accept keyword replies (e.g., ENROUTE, ARRIVED, MAPS). The change cut dispatch time substantially—staffing volunteers 50% faster—now sending over 8,000 messages a month (about 1,300 in Chicago) to roughly 500 active volunteers, and the system is deployed in markets covering about 20% of the U.S. population.

American Red Cross

Jim McGowan

Director of Planning and Situational Awareness