Thank you so much for using Legal Impact for Chickens as your example!!!! It’s an honor. Reading our name here made me so surprised and happy!!!
Thank you, also, for appreciating our desire to focus specifically on reducing suffering.
To address your question:
In my limited experience, starting a new nonprofit over the past two years, I haven’t personally noticed much funging.
To me, it generally seems like the opposite happens—the more we fundraise, the easier it is for us to fundraise.
It seems like many grantors want to see that a nonprofit has a diverse donor base and is putting effort into fundraising. So, my hunch is that receiving each donation generally helps LIC receive more donations in the long run. When we apply for funding, we sometimes brag about how many donors we already have and how much we’ve already raised. And there are certain large grantors that I have been told prefer to fund nonprofits that already have raised at least a certain amount from other sources. Maybe that helps create certainty that the nonprofit is self sufficient?
So, I would guess that this model from your comment above is generally correct: “the opposite of the funging model assumed in my post: an individual donor’s gift led to more funding from [a large grantor] over the long run, not less.”
But there has been one exception: We applied for one small grant from a non-EA grantor and were rejected partly on grounds that we already had raised too much money to qualify.
But I believe that one rejection is outweighed by other, larger, gifts that LIC received partly because we already had already received earlier gifts.
That said, of course, I’m not a grantor. Maybe I’m not really understanding how things work from the perspective of our amazing grantors. (Thank you so much to all of them who may be reading this!)
I’m honored that you’re honored. :) Thanks for the work you do and for your answer here!
there are certain large grantors that I have been told prefer to fund nonprofits that already have raised at least a certain amount from other sources
Are those EA grantors? Or maybe you prefer not to say.
That makes sense about how more donors helps with fundraising. I wonder if that’s more true for a startup charity that has to demonstrate its legitimacy, while for a larger and more established charity, maybe it could go the other way?
Dear Brian,
Thank you so much for using Legal Impact for Chickens as your example!!!! It’s an honor. Reading our name here made me so surprised and happy!!!
Thank you, also, for appreciating our desire to focus specifically on reducing suffering.
To address your question:
In my limited experience, starting a new nonprofit over the past two years, I haven’t personally noticed much funging.
To me, it generally seems like the opposite happens—the more we fundraise, the easier it is for us to fundraise.
It seems like many grantors want to see that a nonprofit has a diverse donor base and is putting effort into fundraising. So, my hunch is that receiving each donation generally helps LIC receive more donations in the long run. When we apply for funding, we sometimes brag about how many donors we already have and how much we’ve already raised. And there are certain large grantors that I have been told prefer to fund nonprofits that already have raised at least a certain amount from other sources. Maybe that helps create certainty that the nonprofit is self sufficient?
So, I would guess that this model from your comment above is generally correct: “the opposite of the funging model assumed in my post: an individual donor’s gift led to more funding from [a large grantor] over the long run, not less.”
But there has been one exception: We applied for one small grant from a non-EA grantor and were rejected partly on grounds that we already had raised too much money to qualify.
But I believe that one rejection is outweighed by other, larger, gifts that LIC received partly because we already had already received earlier gifts.
That said, of course, I’m not a grantor. Maybe I’m not really understanding how things work from the perspective of our amazing grantors. (Thank you so much to all of them who may be reading this!)
Thank you again for mentioning our name!!
Sincerely, Alene & LIC
I’m honored that you’re honored. :) Thanks for the work you do and for your answer here!
Are those EA grantors? Or maybe you prefer not to say.
That makes sense about how more donors helps with fundraising. I wonder if that’s more true for a startup charity that has to demonstrate its legitimacy, while for a larger and more established charity, maybe it could go the other way?
One of them is and one of them isn’t!
Yeah it could totally be a startup thing. :-)