A new website, GiveBack.org, aims to turn nearly everyone into a philanthropist, with a personal foundation like a Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg or Rockefeller. GiveBack (https://www.giveback.org) helps individuals establish a charitable foundation and grow its assets doing ordinary things to increase a person’s capacity to give beyond what they ever thought possible. Created by Stephen Paletta, GiveBack.org was inspired by his experience as the winner of “Oprah’s Big Give,” a reality show highlighting charitable giving created and produced by Oprah Winfrey.
“Our mission is twofold: to change the popular definition of philanthropist and turn everyday acts into charitable acts,” said Paletta. GiveBack puts the tools of a charitable foundation, including account set-up, charity selection, fundraising, managing and reporting in one place, at the click of a mouse and all in the individual’s control. 100 percent of the funds in a foundation go to charity.
After Paletta won numerous challenges to be named the “Big Giver” on “Oprah’s Big Give,” Winfrey surprised him with a check for one million dollars, of which half was to be given to charity. “I was just an everyday guy who suddenly got to be a philanthropist,” said Paletta, a civil engineer from Westchester County, New York. He set up a foundation to distribute the money to more than a dozen charities. “Having extra money to help others was a life changing event and inspired me to devise a way for anyone to give more – and help more – than they ever thought they could.”
To solve the “not enough money to give problem,” as Paletta calls it, especially at a time when resources of both donor and charities are stressed, GiveBack.org will offer a variety of ways to earn money for a foundation. One fundraising method, already active on the site, employs an improved cause-marketing approach that allows a person to accrue money through everyday activities – for example, shopping, dining, buying stamps or sending a package - and distribute it later to one’s own preferred cause or causes, be it Susan G. Komen for the Cure, Doctors Without Borders, a house of worship, all three and even more. How and when a foundation’s funds are distributed are in the control of the GiveBack.org member. A credit card affinity program and payroll deduction plan will be rolled out in early 2011.
Nearly 500 online retailers, including Nike, Apple, Target and Barnes & Noble, now direct a percentage-of-purchase to a GiveBack.org member’s foundation, effortlessly augmenting what a person adds to the account on their own. Money that an individual adds is immediately tax-deductible. All account activity is viewable any time on the site and summarized in one end-of-year tax receipt. More than 1,200,000 IRS-registered charitable organizations are listed on the site and searchable by category or locale.
GiveBack.org kicked off at the close of 2010 with a social media campaign announced by Serena Williams and Steve Nash, two of the co-founders of Mission Skincare, which pledged $5 to each foundation set up by the athletes’ Facebook followers. Paletta envisions ‘everyday philanthropists’ will sponsor similar campaigns to collaborate with friends, family and colleagues who share their desire to help others. In December, Mission Skincare also inaugurated the M Awards, honoring select GiveBack.org members for a charitable deed with a gift of $1000 to their foundations.
About GiveBack .org
GiveBack.org is an online platform and community for charitable
giving, developed by the Give Back Foundation of Greenwich, Connecticut,
with the goal to turn everyday people into philanthropists. The
website, launched in November 2010, enables members to establish a
personal foundation to manage their charitable giving and provides a
variety of ways to earn money for their foundation, empowering them to
donate more to charity. For more information, please visit, https://www.giveback.org/page/About/About.aspx.
About Give Back Foundation
Give Back Foundation is a 501(3)c public charity established in 2010
in Greenwich, Connecticut, by Stephen Paletta, who was inspired by his
experience as a philanthropist after receiving $500,000 to donate to
charity as the winner of the “Oprah’s Big Give” television show. The
Give Back Foundation’s mission is to help people increase their capacity
for charitable giving by empowering them to set up their own individual
foundation account and provide online tools to grow and manage the
account’s assets.
About Give Back LLC
Give Back LLC is a for-profit marketing and operations company that
operates Give Back Foundation. As a separate entity, Give Back LLC
allows the Give Back Foundation to operate at minimal expense,
permitting 100 percent of a member’s foundations funds to go to charity.
Give Back LLC earns money from its corporate sponsors for every
commercial transaction made by members of GiveBack.org.
For more information or to schedule an interview with Stephen Paletta, please contact Jacqueline Burton, 201.888.3352
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