Small Business Donation Requests

GFC25th

Fellow small business owners - ‘tis the season!!
How do you handle all of the donation requests you receive from community members?!? We get soooo mannnny. Especially this time of year…. ✨We are all about giving back to our community but I need a better system!✨

🟢Do you follow a quarterly giving budget?

🟢Have donation request forms to fill out?
<< I saw someone on Instagram suggest adding a question “when was the last time you made a purchase with us?” to a donation request. LOVED that.
🟢Are there specific groups/benefits that you will or won’t donate to?

I would love to hear how others have this set up!

Proud Square Champion (peer user, not Square staff, just a seller like you!). If my insight helped, send a little Kudos love!

Cute little small, diverse coffee shop in the heart of historic downtown Ogden. Woman-owned, inclusive, safe space for all.

TheRealChipA

Hey there @GFC25th. These are definitely questions that all business owners need to think about. We are entering our thirteenth year in business and have some informal guidelines.

No budget here, really. If we want to give and are able to give, we give. If not, we don't.
Also, we have no donation forms, nor do we have "prerequisites." For us, it is less about whether or not someone patronizes our business and more about whether or not giving to them benefits our image and standing in the community.
We do not donate to anything that is political, no matter what politics they are. That being said, we have in the past donated space and discounts to groups that were registering folks to vote, as long as they were non-partisan groups.
Our biggest donation every year is to sponsor the local LGBTQ film festival. It's an event near and dear to our hearts.
Otherwise we don't really have rules or litmus tests. If we have any doubts about what the donation might be used for, we politely decline. If it is a cause/group we support, we do our best to donate something.

We prefer to donate gift cards in most cases. Most of what we are asked to donate to are raffles, or thank-you gifts for group volunteers, etc. In those cases, a $50 gift certificate only costs us the cost of whatever is purchased, and we still get the entire face value of the gift certificate as a deduction. Our film festival donation is an exception as that is a cash donation. We try to limit ourselves to one other full cash donation a year, if at all possible.

Chip A.
Square Expert & Innovator and member of the Square Champions group. (But NOT a Square employee, just a seller like you)

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