Planet Fundraiser, an app born in Birmingham, is revolutionizing charitable giving.
Donating to charities has been made easier due to ever-improving technology, but the innovative app that started right here in Alabama is simplifying things even more. Planet Fundraiser, which started in 2016, allows people to donate from the money they budget every week for everyday expenses, like shopping for groceries or dining out.
ABC 33/40 explains that Planet Fundraiser is “a free fundraising app enabling shoppers to submit a picture of their receipt from any participating merchant. A portion of that purchase is donated by the merchant to a cause of the user’s choice.”
The beauty of the app is that purchases you already make allow you to give to the charities of your choice, completely free of charge to you.
“By choosing to shop at businesses on the app, you’re able to exchange your loyalty in exchange for the cause that you care about,” Drew Honeycutt, the co-founder of Planet Fundraiser, said.
Honeycutt says you can find more than 300 businesses on the app, including popular chains like Chick-fil-A, Shipt and Piggly Wiggly, as well as online businesses. A large variety of charities are featured, too. From your child’s local school to their soccer team, or a non-profit like a women’s shelter or the Red Cross, there is a charity for everyone.
Honeycutt explained the streamlined process that Planet Fundraiser utilizes.
“We send charities one check a month,” Honeycutt said. “That’s the accumulation of the different transactions their supporters went and made that month.”
The Birmingham tech company gives a percentage of any sales made by a customer signed up on the app to that customer’s preferred charity.
Honeycutt says this is changing the landscape of how people contribute while costing them no extra time or money.
“It is creating a way that more people can participate and make a difference,” Honeycut emphasized. “Not everybody can write a check, but you can go shop at these businesses and give back and help the local business community.”
The app was conceived when the other co-founder, Kasey Birdsong, was trying to raise money for his daughter’s T-ball team.
Alabama Newscenter reported earlier this year that “Birdsong was frustrated by the challenges of effectively raising money for the team – how to reach out and to whom, how to persuade people to give, and how to make it easy for them to donate. There must be a better and simpler way, he thought.”
From that experience and a lot of hard work, Planet Fundraiser was born in Birmingham.
Planet Fundraiser is currently in 30 states and continues to expand quickly. The company’s startup was formed through the Innovation Depot’s “Velocity Accelerator” program and funded in part by Shipt CEO, and fellow Alabama tech startup success story, Bill Smith.
Sean Ross is a staff writer for Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @sean_yhn
