In spite of Thursday’s blizzard-like conditions, about 40 people came to celebrate the opening of the new AmeriCorps warehouse, which is stocked with items including energy-efficient windows, doors and lights.

Darryl Tieken, a board member of the Home Depot Foundation, made the trip from Atlanta for the debut of the building at 635 South Park Ave., dubbed “Framing Hope.”

Home Depot donated about $364,000 worth of materials to be sold under a new program managed by WNY AmeriCorps, the local community service organization and nonprofit. The hardware will be sold at steep discounts to nonprofit organizations for use in community buildings and to update homes of clients in need.

While Home Depot has been selling extra stock — sometimes outdated or slightly damaged — to individual nonprofits nationwide for the last several years, the Buffalo warehouse project is a new slant.

AmeriCorps hopes to be distributor to several hundred nonprofits.

Tieken was impressed at the turnout for the warehouse’s debut.

“A lot of people battled the storm,” he said by telephone. “What most set me back was that the community was very supportive of AmeriCorps.”

The warehouse stock is available for sale to local nonprofits of any size. Call 558-3325 for an appointment.

“You would call in and say, ‘I need these things,’ ” said Patrick Metzger, AmeriCorps communication director. The person answering the phone will then make a list and warehouse stock will be checked. Pricing is still being worked out, Metzger said.

Home Depot’s warehouse donation was arranged by Gifts In Kind International, another nonprofit that helps businesses find ways to donate unneeded goods to charity.

“Framing Hope” currently has 30 employees and plans to move from its West Seneca office to an old department store on Seneca at Cazenovia streets.

The warehouse will be managed by ServiceCorps, a group of about 150 AmeriCorps employees—a mix of recent college graduates who work as mentors and young people who have dropped out of school and are getting job training reconstructing houses and making Food Bank deliveries.

Already, there is a request for a front door from West Side Ministries, Metzger said.

“The next step,” he said, “is to make sure we get the word out, so people see it as a resource in the community.”