NFR Chat: What do you think of Fundly.com?

M

marilynfl

Moderator
My friend has a coworker who sent out emails to everyone at work with this request: her college-age daughter wants to take a year of dance classes and she can't afford it. So daughter opened an account at Fundly.com and is asking for small donations to fund said classes. She mentions that while it's a hard economic time for everyone, even a small donation would help her achieve her dream.

My friend has never seen this girl, but she recognizes the mother because it's a small company.

I'm a little dazed at the audacity for such a self-serving request, but then I may just be cheap. Email is free, account is free...any donation at all would be pure profit. What has she got to lose?

What's your take? And would you donate to this kind of request?

(Edited to add: The girl mentions that she has looked for a job, but can't find any. However, she still wants to take the dance classes.)

http://fundly.com/

 
Sites like that are proliferating--see also Kickstarter.com, Indiegogo.com.

Many of them do charge a fee to use their services, and to process credit-card donations; for Fundly, it's 1.9% of the total raised and 3% for credit-card donations. Kickstarter (which is designed as a platform for funding artistic projects) takes 5% and Amazon (who processes Kickstarter donations) takes 3%-5% on top of that for the credit-card processing. I'm not sure about Indiegogo. As far as I understand, it's all-or-nothing fundraising: you set a goal, and if you miss it for any reason, the project goes unfunded.

I guess I'm of two minds about it... For someone to send out a list to *co-workers* soliciting donations for a family/child activity strikes me as a little dicey--it's not quite the same as soliciting for Girl Scout cookies, since the profits go directly to one individual and no further. On the other hand, the platforms exist, these days, to fundraise this way, and there always seems to be money to be made.

Personally, though, it doesn't sit that well with me unless it's for a project that has some life beyond the donation (i.e., a Kickstarter arts project). A parent sending out a plea (particularly on behalf of a college student who could presumably be working to pay for the dance lessons--or at least make the plea, or come up with a plan, herself) like this one just seems...odd.

I mean... I would like to go to any number of writing conferences, but those also cost money and require budgeting and planning. It seems like a teachable moment, to me, and I don't think what the parent is doing teaches the daughter much, in this case. (Edited to add: Ah, I didn't realize the daughter set up the Fundly account and started the requests.)

/my two cents

 
One of my much younger cousins did this to raise money for a very elective

surgery on her dog. I was appalled. I also told her I couldn't help her because I was still paying my own vet bill from the illness that my dog died of in December.

 
New to me, but I think we are living in a lazy society. I have trouble with young & healthy men

sitting on streets asking little old retired people for money. I have offered jobs to people that I thought were earnest.

When I was a kid......oh the old "when I was a kid", if we wanted anything, we collected bottles, babysat, got odd jobs, cleaned windows. I sure am sounding old.

Anyone see the article about a panhandler who claimed to have earned more than $60,000 in the US, in one year, tax-free, just begging? He said it sure wouldn't make sense for him to work.

 
It looks like there are some genuinely good causes on here, but they'll take anybody

willing to sign up and create a page. It doesn't say much for the site, which probably takes a small percentage.

If this girl, say, wanted to open a dance studio in an under-served area that would be one thing, but "buy me lessons" is pretty self-serving.

 
I know someone funding a movie this way, but they do get something for their $

One they'll get the movie and two, if you look to the right on that page you'll see different price points in donations get different things. Also, if the money isn't raised in x amount of time, the requester gets nothing.

I didn't think they just had give me some money sites, heck if there is someplace I can post where folks will just give me money to do repairs on the house let me know!

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/58936338/space-command
 
Panhandlers in SF make that kind of money. I once saw a "changing of the guard" in a wheelchair,...

a new guy came up and relieved him. He got out of the wheelchair, took off his vet uniform jacket and handed it to the new guy who was going to use the wheelchair. Saw this while waiting for the light to change near Stanford Univ.

In fact that 50K number was from an article in the SF newspaper well over 10-15 yrs ago. Wonder what they make now?

 
"- - - looked for a job, but can't find any." Ah, but is seeking dance lessons that are more

important than landing any job. She wants to live off of supporters and she has no real established dancing talent as I see it.

I don't think that her Mom is instilling any worthwhile values for her daughter by begging for her support.

McDonald's would be a more respectable start for her than begging for a frivolous handout when people are starving in this country!

 
professional panhandlers make that everywhere...

there was an anonymous interview in the local paper with a couple who panhandled here during the warm months. They collected about $125,000 each year between the two of them, then they flew to Florida for the winter and vacationed.

 
I have a staunch rule against giving panhandlers money, but I often offer food

on the chance that they are truly hungry. Most of the time they turn me down, so you can tell who the truly needy are.

 
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