Just 64 Cents a Day

VIEWPOINT - 

It’s a mystery.

Why is every major nonprofit all of a sudden asking us to contribute $19 a month? 

That dollar figure, now used by every direct-response charity from the ACLU to Planned Parenthood to St. Jude’s Hospital, may at first glance seem arbitrary, even capricious. But few marketing strategies have ever been so thoroughly parsed. 

The $19 appeal is phenomenally successful. According to the National Council on Nonprofits, it has raised billions. That should come as no surprise to us- except for medicines we can neither pronounce nor understand, with side effects like, um, snoring, thrush and death, our television channels are replete with hopeful children and starving animals. 

We haven’t gotten more philanthropic nor have the missions expanded. It’s all about price points and donor psychology. Contributing to a charity on-line or by phone is the very definition of impulse giving. Pick up the phone or hit PayPal while the commercial is still on the air, or move on. The “sweet spot” price point tells you intuitively that your gift is cheap enough to be affordable, yet large enough to seem meaningful. 

That “sweet spot,” for impulse charitable giving, thanks in large measure to the ubiquitous ATM, is twenty dollars. We use twenty-dollar bills to tip waiters and delivery boys, valet our cars and buy Girl Scout cookies, so we know they have value. We also feel anything over twenty dollars seems pricey, and under twenty affordable. It clearly doesn’t have to be much under twenty to turn our heads, apparently. 

But if $19 a month can fill the charitable coffers, wouldn’t $18 a month bring in even more? Curiously perhaps, no. A few charities tried that figure, and lower ones as well, and to their surprise, $19 drew best. We are trying to help, not hunt for the best bargain. 

The “$19 a month” appeal is likely to be around for a long time. No wonder fund raisers love it-it meets the three criteria of fundraising: obtain the gift, maintain the gift (it is $19 a month, after all) and grow the gift (after a few years at this level, and a more thoughtful appraisal, maybe you’re ready for a major gift). It also replaces the old fundraising letter, which is dead as a doornail (however dead that is). 

Charities have clearly learned a lesson from Netflix and other apps: once you make your initial $19 gift, you will continue making that gift until you actively drop out. But why drop out? It’s for a good cause, and as we are so often reminded, it’s just 64 cents a day. 

(Jack Shakely is president emeritus of the California Community Foundation in Los Angeles.)