April, I appreciated your call re: the need for new models and policy changes to regard and support the societal benefits collaborative sharing can offer.
With our current economic model, that values income and cash, the conundrum of how to measure and include societal benefits in the valuation of collaborative efforts also applies in the provision of human service programming.
“What gets measured counts.” And human service nonprofits typically secure funding by shaping programs to funder requirements. The programs must measure and quantify their success as target numbers in a cause and effect model. However, the funding focus, amount and length of the grant, and unit of analysis is often too small to really make substantial or systematic change. Social problems are complex and vast, thus the symptoms, and not the social problem as a whole, get the attention.
Yes. We need to step back, coordinate, re-frame and review our economic theories and social problems expanding them to thoughtful, adaptive, interdisciplinary learning models.
Really enjoyed the article.
I am working in Barbados on developing approaches to solving social investment needs by strengthening specific qualified grantees and matching them with the needed resources to achieve impact and sustainability.
Would welcome ideas.
Thank you all for your great comments. I’m pleased to see these ideas gain traction beyond their “typical” audiences and do believe there is enormous opportunity ahead. It will take broader awareness, but we are already starting to see that happen—and reason to believe that will grow even more (and more quickly) moving forward.
Thanks for the article, April. Well done. I cover what we do below but first wanted to say that I think the trends you note are firmly in place and that there are a number of small organizations with interesting and sustainable models that will be “growing up” in the upcoming years, disrupting the usual way of doing things and creating positive impact.
We’ve been working on a platform that is focused upon goods based giving - specifically, food donated via food drives.. We launched last June and its usage is growing nicely.
Similar to crowd-funding, people and organizations can run a food drive campaign using our platform. People visit a campaign’s unique web page to make a donation. However, rather than donating money as they would at a crowd-funding site, people purchase specific food items to donate. When the food drive is over, Amp delivers all of the food directly to the food pantry, soup kitchen or shelter supported by the drive.
As you may know, there are millions of food drives conducted each year in the US that raise over $10 Billion worth of food. There are many issues with how traditional drives work that our platform improves upon including two big ones.
First, as with most goods based giving, a significant percentage of food donated to traditional food drives is thrown away. A typical food drive might produce anywhere from 5% to 50% of unusable food (expired, damaged, the wrong goods). Our platform includes a wedding register like feature so that as people select food items to donate, the only items available are those that match what the hunger organization tells us they need. Our platform turns formerly wasted donations into donations that count so that 100% of the donated food is able to feed someone.
Second, nearly all food drives are “traditional” drives, limited to collecting non-perishable food. Due to Amp’s food delivery methodology, food drives on our site are able to raise fresh produce and other healthy foods, enabling them to have more positive impact. In this regard, our vision is to turn the billions of canned goods donated each year to food drives into billions of apples, oranges, sweet potatoes and other healthy food items.
The overall aim of what we are doing is to provide a way for food drives to raise more usable food and food that has greater impact. We accomplish this by making goods based giving as easy as donating money, through our wedding registry feature and by eliminating the barriers of time and distance that traditional drives face.
As with many things, we have developed technology that is disrupting the traditional way of doing things. In our case, we not only create massive efficiencies, but we are also tied to a cultural trend regarding trust. (See Edelman Trust Barometer) . Goods based giving, although it requires more time and energy than donating money, remains a popular form of giving because donors are able to define their donation’s impact. Making goods based giving as easy as donating money is a powerful accelerate for this form of helping out. We believe that people will give more if they understand their impact and our data bears this out.
Hope this wasn’t too long of a comment, but what we do requires some explanation.
Many thanks, Patrick. I really appreciate your comment. What you don’t mention however is the name of your platform / initiative? It would be great to learn more about it.
There is quite a lot of activity in the sharing economy related to food and agriculture, from social eating (like Feastly and EatWith) to rethinking sustainable supply chains for local farmers. Related to food waste, two of my favorite platforms are:
Not far from the Tree (Canada): fruit gleaning in cities, with shared harvests http://notfarfromthetree.org/
Food Cloud (Ireland): partnering with food-related businesses and local charities http://foodcloud.ie/
Look forward to continuing to spark these ideas and opportunities!
COMMENTS
BY Eriko Kennedy
ON February 5, 2015 11:23 AM
April, I appreciated your call re: the need for new models and policy changes to regard and support the societal benefits collaborative sharing can offer.
With our current economic model, that values income and cash, the conundrum of how to measure and include societal benefits in the valuation of collaborative efforts also applies in the provision of human service programming.
“What gets measured counts.” And human service nonprofits typically secure funding by shaping programs to funder requirements. The programs must measure and quantify their success as target numbers in a cause and effect model. However, the funding focus, amount and length of the grant, and unit of analysis is often too small to really make substantial or systematic change. Social problems are complex and vast, thus the symptoms, and not the social problem as a whole, get the attention.
Yes. We need to step back, coordinate, re-frame and review our economic theories and social problems expanding them to thoughtful, adaptive, interdisciplinary learning models.
BY Maureen Hackett
ON February 5, 2015 11:57 AM
Great article, April. If only we can execute on this, think of the changes we can see and the people who will be better served…in healthcare alone!
BY Peter N. Boos
ON February 5, 2015 04:25 PM
Really enjoyed the article.
I am working in Barbados on developing approaches to solving social investment needs by strengthening specific qualified grantees and matching them with the needed resources to achieve impact and sustainability.
Would welcome ideas.
BY April Rinne
ON February 7, 2015 01:30 PM
Thank you all for your great comments. I’m pleased to see these ideas gain traction beyond their “typical” audiences and do believe there is enormous opportunity ahead. It will take broader awareness, but we are already starting to see that happen—and reason to believe that will grow even more (and more quickly) moving forward.
BY Patrick ONeill
ON February 8, 2015 04:51 AM
Thanks for the article, April. Well done. I cover what we do below but first wanted to say that I think the trends you note are firmly in place and that there are a number of small organizations with interesting and sustainable models that will be “growing up” in the upcoming years, disrupting the usual way of doing things and creating positive impact.
We’ve been working on a platform that is focused upon goods based giving - specifically, food donated via food drives.. We launched last June and its usage is growing nicely.
Similar to crowd-funding, people and organizations can run a food drive campaign using our platform. People visit a campaign’s unique web page to make a donation. However, rather than donating money as they would at a crowd-funding site, people purchase specific food items to donate. When the food drive is over, Amp delivers all of the food directly to the food pantry, soup kitchen or shelter supported by the drive.
As you may know, there are millions of food drives conducted each year in the US that raise over $10 Billion worth of food. There are many issues with how traditional drives work that our platform improves upon including two big ones.
First, as with most goods based giving, a significant percentage of food donated to traditional food drives is thrown away. A typical food drive might produce anywhere from 5% to 50% of unusable food (expired, damaged, the wrong goods). Our platform includes a wedding register like feature so that as people select food items to donate, the only items available are those that match what the hunger organization tells us they need. Our platform turns formerly wasted donations into donations that count so that 100% of the donated food is able to feed someone.
Second, nearly all food drives are “traditional” drives, limited to collecting non-perishable food. Due to Amp’s food delivery methodology, food drives on our site are able to raise fresh produce and other healthy foods, enabling them to have more positive impact. In this regard, our vision is to turn the billions of canned goods donated each year to food drives into billions of apples, oranges, sweet potatoes and other healthy food items.
The overall aim of what we are doing is to provide a way for food drives to raise more usable food and food that has greater impact. We accomplish this by making goods based giving as easy as donating money, through our wedding registry feature and by eliminating the barriers of time and distance that traditional drives face.
As with many things, we have developed technology that is disrupting the traditional way of doing things. In our case, we not only create massive efficiencies, but we are also tied to a cultural trend regarding trust. (See Edelman Trust Barometer) . Goods based giving, although it requires more time and energy than donating money, remains a popular form of giving because donors are able to define their donation’s impact. Making goods based giving as easy as donating money is a powerful accelerate for this form of helping out. We believe that people will give more if they understand their impact and our data bears this out.
Hope this wasn’t too long of a comment, but what we do requires some explanation.
BY April Rinne
ON February 11, 2015 10:38 AM
Many thanks, Patrick. I really appreciate your comment. What you don’t mention however is the name of your platform / initiative? It would be great to learn more about it.
There is quite a lot of activity in the sharing economy related to food and agriculture, from social eating (like Feastly and EatWith) to rethinking sustainable supply chains for local farmers. Related to food waste, two of my favorite platforms are:
Not far from the Tree (Canada): fruit gleaning in cities, with shared harvests http://notfarfromthetree.org/
Food Cloud (Ireland): partnering with food-related businesses and local charities http://foodcloud.ie/
Look forward to continuing to spark these ideas and opportunities!
BY Patrick ONeill
ON February 11, 2015 06:33 PM
I suppose it would have been a good idea to include a link to our site 😊
It’s http://www.ampyourgood.com.
Also, here’s a post about a slightly different view on the Sharing economy - something I posted on LinkedIn that generated a lot of interest.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20140623155003-18749264-uber-and-the-original-sharing-economy
And thanks for the links! Really interesting!!