Ten (10) Charity programs: Donate money without spending an extra cent!

Earth in Hands design by Kat as turp.deviant.com
Adirondack Giving Tuesday Can Happen All Year Long!

Even though #GivingTuesday is officially the Tuesday after Black Friday, Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday, I always hope that the act of giving will remain an everyday occurrence for my children.

It is wonderful that such huge event remind us that giving is much more important than getting. It is also important to remember that it doesn't always have to be a grand gesture. Sometimes the small gestures are the ones that count the most.  

Since #GivingTuesday only happens one time a year, here are 10 other programs that make the act of giving an everyday experience every time you shop, do an internet search or play a game. The programs listed below do not cost you one penny. These are all corporate affiliate programs that allow a percentage of your everyday purchases to go to the cause of your choice.

Keep in mind these suggestions are in no way  a substitute for your already generous acts of kindness to food pantries, animal shelters and the arts. These programs are all ways to contribute in addition to supporting the charitable causes close to your heart.

There are large scale programs such as AmazonSmile where every time you buy something from Amazon, the organization will donate 0.5% of the price to a charity of your choice.  (But I prefer the GoodSearch, GoodShop option which still allows you to search at Amazon, but includes other large retail chains as well.)

The GoodSearch network. 
• Use GoodSearch to search the internet and a penny for nearly all searches will go to the charity of your choice.
• If you use  GoodShop at more than 2,800 participating stores (including Amazon) a percentage of what you spend it donated to the charity of your choice.
 GoodSurveys is more interactive and requires you to fill out a survey. For each survey filled out $1 goes toward your charity.
• With Gooddining, you can dine at over 10,000 restaurants and up to 6% of your bill goes to support the cause of your choice. ,
Good-to-go add-ons Add the GoodShop To Go Button and Goodsearch plug in on your page and others can help with your cause.
• Goodgames is fun and entertaining. Play any combination of good games 3X and a penny will go to your cause. Around the Adirondack there are plenty of ways for families to get involved, not just with the global event Giving Tuesday, but with smaller activities that can impact our local communities.

iGIVE is considered more an online shopping mall, but you have to install the iGive button where it runs silently behind network notifying the participating shops of your purchase. Then a donation to the charity of your choice.  CharityBlast also asks nonprofits to register for a shopping page. Then participants can shop directly from that page, creating the necessary links that make the charitable donations possible.

Greater Good uses onsite clicks paid for by sponsors to generate funds for highlighted charities. Your can click the CLICK HERE BAR to support hunger, breast cancer awareness and more. You can even sign up for a daily email reminder so you never forget to comeback and click.

Give as You Live! is a UK based affiliate program that allows anyone shopping in the UK to raise money for charity.

Schools can raise funds through larger organization by joining the 2Click network or larger grocery chains such as Stop and Shop, Price Chopper and Hannaford.

Hannafords program is called School Dollars. Schools need to register and families need to choose the appropriate school that will benefit. Four products = $3 school dollars. With Price Chopper's Tools for Schools program you have to enter your 10-digit AdvantEdge card number to affiliate your purchase with the school of your choice.  Stop and Shop hosts its A+ School Rewards  which is also attached to the bonus points card.

*These  programs do cost more than a penny, but I love the concept so much, I had to mention them! 

In the Adirondacks, a family favorite is Adirondack Gives. The website is similar to Kickstarter but is strictly geared toward ongoing projects in the Adirondack Park. It is fun for my children to be able to check out the various campaigns and choose to allocate some of their hard earned bottle-redeemable cash or babysitting money.

The Shop for Change storefront allows people to search for unique sustainable products from around the globe. In addition from choosing a handcrafted item that is supporting a community, you can narrow your search results for products that support causes you believe in such as Safe Water, Access to Education, Poverty and Hunger and more.

There is not just one way to give.  Give food, give money or give some of your time. Give generously of yourself, just give something. Keep in mind that the more you give the more there is to get out of giving.

Adirondack Family time guidebooks
For Lake Placid Saranac Lake,
Upper Lake and the High Peaks
include 33 easy hikes, 19 swimming holes,
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Generosity is like kindness. The more you experience, the more you have to share.  The best way children will learn empathy and for us to foster a generation of altruistic people is to demonstrate the importance of giving. Have fun!

By the way, #GivingTuesday shouldn't be confused with India's Joy of Giving week that takes place in early October, now known as Daan Utsav. Daan Utsav is a festival of philanthropy with the goal to engage all walks of life in the act of giving.

Earth in Hands design by Kat as turp.deviant.com

Follow Diane Chase on Twitter @familytime

© Diane Chase is the author of the Adirondack Family Activities™ guidebook series, Adirondack Family Time™guidebooks have easy Adirondack family hikes, Adirondack swimming holes, Lake Placid Olympic activities, Adirondack trivia, Adirondack horseback rides, Adirondack snowshoe family trails and more. Look for the Adirondack family guidebook online or bookstores/museums/sporting good stores. Diane is currently working on the next Adirondack Family Activities™ guide.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Great list of tools to fundraise for your charity. Sadly, Charity Blast has gone out of business and their link no longer works.

GivingAssistant.org is a newer version of Charity Blast and has a dedicated landing page for Adirondack Foundation here:

https://givingassistant.org/np#adirondack-community-trust

Hope you enjoy Giving Assistant and let me know if I can help further.

Best,

Ryan Quiel
CoFounder at Giving Assistant

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