In 2020, Minnesota nonprofits counted on GiveMN to help it navigate twin challenges: Covid-19 and serving BIPOC populations following George Floyd’s killing.

GiveMN, founded in 2009, was uniquely positioned to respond because thousands of nonprofits had already used the organization’s platform to raise money, so GiveMN was a trusted partner. The nonprofit sector faced severe financial tests in 2020 and 2021. GiveMN stepped up to bolster the resiliency of nonprofits so they could survive and serve people for many years to come. 

Covid-19 forced the cancellation of in-person fundraisers. “Suddenly almost every type of fundraising strategy had to become digital,” says Jake Blumberg, GiveMN’s executive director.  

Prior to that tumultuous year, Blumberg says that numerous BIPOC-serving and BIPOC-led nonprofits had used the GiveMN platform to raise funds. In addition, he says, several BIPOC-centered organizations had received one-on-one coaching advice through a GiveMN program called RaiseMN. “The vast majority of the organizations that we serve are so under-resourced—in terms of fundraising knowledge, strategy, and infrastructure—that they needed help on that front.”

During the uncertain spring of 2020, GiveMN’s leadership recognized that nonprofits needed money and good advice to help them meet the pressing needs of Minnesotans dealing with financial challenges and social and racial strife.

“We launched back-to-back crisis fundraising coaching both for organizations responding to the pandemic, but also organizations that were responding to Mr. Floyd’s murder and the aftermath,” Blumberg says.

“We provided that coaching free of charge,” he notes. “We were going to set our business model aside to serve our community through these crises.”

Hundreds of nonprofits got virtual coaching through RaiseMN and thousands of nonprofits leveraged the GiveMN website to raise money. In 2020, $51.6 million was raised on the GiveMN.org platform, which was a dramatic increase over the $28.5 million raised the year before.

“We were going to set our business model aside to serve our community through these crises.”

—Jake Blumberg, executive director

The dollars that have recently flowed to the platform are well above the pre-pandemic level. In 2022, the money generated on the platform totaled $41.5 million. 

Blumberg, who’s led GiveMN for seven years, says the organization strives to enable nonprofits to increase their fundraising dollars, so they can have a bigger impact serving people in need.

On Nov. 16, GiveMN will mark the 15th anniversary of Give to the Max Day, when nonprofits simultaneously market their organizations and receive contributions on the GiveMN platform. In 2022, Give to the Max Day produced $34 million in fundraising for 6,439 organizations.

The notion to collectively fundraise emerged in the late 2000s, after many of the state’s large foundations were being asked to financially support upgrades to individual nonprofit websites that would allow nonprofits to do online fundraising. 

GiveMN continues to refine its platform and respond to the critical needs of nonprofits. That includes tapping underwriters to financially support coaching services for small nonprofits. Providing access to fundraising expertise, Blumberg says, is a central element in GiveMN’s mission to “grow giving and ignite generosity across our state.”

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