If you are a nonprofit entrepreneur, finding grants in this economy can be a real challenge. A great, off-beat way to locate little-known charities and foundations is through "vote for me" contests. That's how I found out that In-n-Out Burger and singer Ludacris have foundations that offer funding for child-related and social services. (The Ludacris Foundation is giving away 20 free cars but you need to enter before 09/03/09.)
To find even more grants, consider subscribing to GrantStation, a great searchable database listing thousands of grant opportunities. Their normal prices are steep for small nonprofits, but from time-to-time they pair up with TechSoup to offer deep discounts.
If you are interested, mark your calendars: September 16 at 8 a.m. Pacific Time and ending September 17 at 5 p.m. Pacific Time GrantStation is offering specially discounted GrantStation Memberships (through TechSoup) to eligible nonprofits for only $99. Learn more about this special offer.
GrantStation.com also offers various promotional prices and offers throughout the year for individuals not affiliated with TechSoup (which does require a membership application), via the GrantStation website.
In addition, just to offer a quick tip for locating grants:
There are four areas of funding that any entrepreneur can tap into:
-Federal
-State
-International
-U.S. Foundation
On the free note (and everyone should like free), each week on GrantStation we offer a funding opportunity from each area mentioned above that is available to the public… including an entire state worth of links to funding opportunities within a given geographic area.
That is just a very small sample of the information that people who subscribe have access to, but it is a great way to decide if GrantStation.com is a good investment for your business.
Thanks, Jeremy! This is great to know. I have been very happy with GrantStation’s services and their outreach to charities by offering discounts.
Nice article Scott!
Personally, I am a private entrepreneur and I am saving money for creating a nonprofit organization to offer free education to Childs in South America.
Thanks for posting this, often finding the money to start up a nonprofit business can be difficult but the first thing is to know where to start looking!