Grapevine Giving Foundation Receives Grant from the Fidelity Charitable® Catalyst Fund to Expand Giving Circle Matching Campaigns

Grapevine Giving Foundation has received a grant from the Fidelity Charitable® Catalyst Fund, to be deployed over twelve months to expand Giving Circle matching campaigns in thirteen priority states. The Catalyst Fund is a grantmaking program of Fidelity Charitable, an independent 501(c)(3) public charity, and is separate from its donor-advised fund program.

This award expands an existing relationship between the two organizations. The Fidelity Charitable Catalyst Fund has supported the Grapevine Giving Foundation since 2023. Earlier grants helped the Grapevine Giving Foundation launch new Giving Circles, train new Giving Circle leaders, and provide its free platform alongside wrap-around coaching and support to groups in the Catalyst Fund's target regions.

The Catalyst Fund’s current thirteen priority states are: Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico, Nevada, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and West Virginia.

Closing the Funding Gap

The choice of these thirteen states is deliberate. They are concentrated in the Southwest, Deep South, and Central Appalachia regions, which the Fidelity Charitable Catalyst Fund has identified as regions of the country that see some of the lowest quality of life outcomes across the country. These regions see higher poverty rates, lower economic mobility across generations, and lower life expectancy.

At the same time, these regions also receive the lowest amount of philanthropy per person, limiting their opportunity to ensure communities can thrive. Nonprofits in these regions receive 2.3x less philanthropy per person than the most advantaged states and 3.5x when looking more closely at donor-advised fund donations.

The Catalyst Fund has also noted that this funding disparity disproportionately affects communities of color and rural communities in these regions, where nonprofits often serve as critical infrastructure for everything from healthcare access to economic opportunity. The gap doesn't reflect a shortage of need or a shortage of organizations doing extraordinary work. It reflects where philanthropic dollars have historically flowed, and where they haven't.

Matching campaigns are a direct way to change that math. When a group of donors come together to learn, deliberate, and give collectively, the result is greater than the sum of its parts. With matching dollars from the Catalyst Fund grant, every dollar a Giving Circle member gives can go twice as far for the nonprofits they choose to support. A match also carries a message: that the work a Giving Circle is funding is the kind of work a major national funder believes in too. With this support from the Fidelity Charitable® Catalyst Fund, Grapevine can extend that signal to more Giving Circles, more donors, and more nonprofits across the thirteen priority states.

More Than Money Moved

The case for Giving Circles isn't only about dollars. In 2023, the U.S. Surgeon General issued an advisory declaring loneliness and social isolation a public health crisis, with health impacts comparable to smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day (Office of the U.S. Surgeon General, 2023). The advisory pointed to community participation and collective service as part of the path forward, citing the role that meaningful connection plays in individual and population health.

Giving Circles sit squarely in that intersection. Research from the Dorothy A. Johnson Center for Philanthropy, Colmena Consulting, and Philanthropy Together found that 74% of Giving Circle participants joined specifically to form connections within their community (Johnson Center for Philanthropy, 2024a), and 91% reported a positive impact on their sense of community belonging as a result of their participation (Johnson Center for Philanthropy, 2024b). Therefore, expanding Giving Circles is a way to expand the kind of social connection the Surgeon General has called for.

What's Next

Over the coming months, we'll be rolling out matching campaigns across the Grapevine platform and inviting Giving Circles to participate. If you lead or belong to a Giving Circle, host one through Grapevine, or run a nonprofit that might benefit from being featured in an upcoming match, visit grapevine.org to get started.

To our community and nonprofit partners: thank you for building this with us. And to the team at the Fidelity Charitable® Catalyst Fund, thank you for believing that everyday collective giving, multiplied, can make a bigger impact.

About the Grapevine Giving Foundation

Grapevine Giving Foundation (GGF) is Grapevine’s 501(c)(3) public charity arm that is on a mission to revolutionize philanthropy through the power of collective giving. Grapevine Giving Foundation enables Grapevine to facilitate charitable donations, offer tax receipts, and provide additional philanthropic resources like seed funding and donation matching to Giving Circles. In this way, Grapevine Giving Foundation enables the Grapevine platform to extend its commitment to growing and propelling the Giving Circle movement.