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We Built This Brand explores the origins, evolution, and impact of brands through conversations with entrepreneurs, CEOs, and marketing experts. Hosted by Chris Hill, the podcast offers insights into brand development, storytelling, and strategies for growth. Each episode provides actionable takeaways, highlighting challenges, lessons learned, and diverse career paths. With a focus on authenticity and reputation, it’s a valuable resource for anyone passionate about branding and business.
Mary: The organizations that succeeded during COVID were the ones that went, "Wait a minute, this is gonna be longer than two weeks, and I've got to do something to serve our clientele and, and our individuals with what's happening right now."
Chris: Welcome to We Built This Brand, where we pull back the curtain on the people, the ideas, and the sometimes challenging process of building something that matters.
Today, I'm joined by Mary Walker, the founder of Leafspring. Mary trains nonprofit leaders and has served in a variety of nonprofit staff and board roles, including the director of development. Over the past several years, she has helped hundreds of organizations build strong, efficient programs through strategic planning, financial planning, business systems, and revenue development.
Mary's clients have gone on to raise hundreds of millions of dollars to support social services, animal welfare, environmental, educational, and many other causes. Today, she's here to share the system she developed to help you raise more money with less chaos and more confidence. So without further ado, here's my conversation with Mary Walker of Leafspring.
All righty. Well, M- Mary, welcome to We Built This Brand.
Mary: Thank you very much. It's an honor to be here.
Chris: Absolutely. I am so glad to have you here today after a few failed attempts- ... to get together, and some illness and some whatever else we had going on. Life. Life. Life. It was just-
Mary: Yes ...
Chris: very eventful the last few weeks.
Mary: Well, thank you for having me. Yeah. Like I said, I'm honored to be here, and a, a lot of great people have come before you, so I'm happy to be here between, between the palms-
Chris: Absolutely ...
Mary: as, as they say.
Chris: Absolutely. And we're happy to, happy to have you and happy to be talking to you today about everything, and would just like to kinda dive in, talk to you about your background and what led you to start Leafspring.
Mary: Yeah. It's been a long road, and I think, well, partially because I'm, I'm not 23. Mm. But i- I think a lot of times when you get to where you're getting, it's not a straight path. Mm-hmm. And I went to school to be a doctor, because, oh, I'm going to be a doctor, and I got into my biology degree and realized I don't like sick people or body fluids, and I said, "Okay, I should probably look for something else."
Finished the degree, and then got my MBA. Business had kind of been the discussion at home. My family had a family business. We were in the automotive world. And, and I really was drawn to it. And so I got the MBA. I took the corporate job. I worked for Holiday Inns, helped them decide where to put new hotels.
Chris: Oh, nice.
Mary: A lot of numbers. It was- Yeah ... considered a marketing job, but it was very research-based- Mm ... very numbers-based, financial based. And then I took a job with, uh, Kraft Food Ingredients in Memphis, and we actually supplied in... It was B2B sales. I was in charge of caramel, and caramel is messy and- Oh
sticky. Mm-hmm. And people don't like to deal with it, so they would buy caramel from Kraft- And we, our, our customers were Hershey and Keebler and people like this, and they would put it into their things. So I did that for a, a good bit. Moved back to Knoxville, uh, with my husband in, I think '93, and joined the family business, which, so it was automotive, and just loved it.
It's, you know, a lot of people, uh, the car business, "Oh, that's a horrible business to be in," whatever. It's a really, really tight margin business, and a lot of volume, but very tight margins, and things can go askew really quickly. And so just learning to manage that and having systems in place to make sure it was balanced all the time, and I, I really enjoyed it.
We sold those businesses in, like, 2004, and at that time I had kids that were primary and middle school, and I'm like, "I need to, I need to make sure I'm here." So I started working for a nonprofit because of the flexibility. The salary's not so great necessarily, but the flexibility was amazing. I could be home with them when I needed to.
It, it was great. And going into the nonprofits, I started realizing a lot of this business for-profit experience that I had transfers so well into the nonprofit world. And I would walk into... I was on a couple of boards, and we'd be talking finances, and I'd go, "Oh, I think you need to do this, this, this."
They're like, "How do you know that?" I said, "I, I don't know. It just, it's what you would do." And I'm like, wow, I've got things that I can bring to this. So I, so I worked for a couple of different nonprofits. I did fundraising for the Knoxville Museum of Art and, and then I finally said, "You know, I'm just gonna hang out my own shingle.
This is gonna be my retirement job, and I'll work when I want to and not when I don't want to." And so I started the company, and it's become much bigger than I thought it was going to. It takes up a lot more of my time than I anticipated, but I love every minute of it. And what I've discovered is that So many nonprofit leaders are so passionate about what they do, and they're really good at delivering their mission.
They can feed the hungry people, they can vaccinate the animals, they can put the art on the wall, but they may not have had a lot of experience with running an organization. So I stay away from telling people how to do their mission. They know how to do that. But I help with things like strategic planning and financial planning and fundraising.
I don't do fundraising, but I teach it. And as I've mentioned to you before, boards behaving badly, but governance and board issues and, and bylaws and things like that. And I have just enjoyed it. I just thought it would just be a side gig, and now it has turned into a much bigger thing for me.
Chris: That is a neat journey.
And, you know, I have my MBA as well. So, like, I've, I've been down that road of trying to, you know, figure out a career path, and very, very early on I knew I wanted to get my MBA, but I realized I needed it, I guess I should say. Mm. After I had actually done a startup and a small business, I was like, "I could still use some business sense."
Right. "Let's, you know, let's go back to school and see what, see what's there to learn." And, and, you know, going, getting in the non- into the nonprofit space is just such a, a neat, um... It's just a neat field. I mean, I've done a lot of work with, um, the American Marketing Association- Yes ... which is a nonprofit.
Mm-hmm. And I have a lot of experience, like being on the board, being in leadership there, and, and doing all that, so I know the challenges that come with- Mm ... engaging and building a community and, and trying to raise funds for your organization and, and for causes and things. So now that you have Leafspring, what would you say, like, is your core focus with it?
What are you, what are you doing right now? And kinda like where do you see the business being focused?
Mary: Well, initially, and up 'til now, it has been very, uh, singularly focused on helping one nonprofit at a time. My, my husband says, "Saving the world one nonprofit at a time," and we, we joke about that. And, and honestly, I, I had a website, and I don't get much business off my website.
I get business from pe- from referrals. Mm. And all... I, I, I don't advertise, um, because it's just coming organically as much as I can handle, which is such a great problem to have. Uh, but like this morning, I got a text from somebody that said, "Hey, you did a strategic plan for an organization I was part of t- three years ago.
I'm on the board of a new organization. Would you be willing to look at a strategic plan for us?" And I'm like, wow, that's really cool. It's so affirming. Like, okay, I think I'm making a difference, and, and that's ultimately what this is about. So that one-on-one customizing what I do for the organization.
And then what we do is we break down... I feel like for anything you do, you have to know where you are- You have to know where you're going, and then you have to figure out how you're gonna get there. So you have to understand what your current place is. This is all strategic planning. But in development, where's your money coming from now?
How much of it are you earning? How much of it is, is donated? If it's donated, h- what categories is it being donated in? Are you getting grants? Are you getting major donors? Are you getting, uh, are you do- running fundraising events? And then I have this little section called collective donors, which are the donors that are smaller than major donors, but a lot of times you think of them collectively.
Like you, you run an, um, annual campaign, or you send out a Christmas letter or something like that. So you think about those in that way. So we divide up all of your current income into those so we understand organically what we have already. Mm-hmm. 'Cause if you are kicking butt and taking names on fundraising events, then we're gonna lean into that.
If you've never done a fundraising event, then maybe n- do you have the DNA in your organization to do that? Maybe you do, maybe you don't. So we figure out where we are. Then we go and say, "Well, what do we, what do we want to have? How much do we need? If we want to fulfill our mission, what do we have to do that?"
And I find a lot of times people go, "Oh, we're just gonna increase it by 4% a year." Mm-hmm. And I call this the 4% a year fallacy. The reason being is that if you just say, think about, "I'm gonna raise 4 more percent." Mm-hmm. Well, what's it gonna take to do that? It's gonna take 4% more effort. It's gonna take 4% more calls to donors.
It's gonna find 4% more donor, all the things. And at the end of the year you go, "Wow, you did a great job. You raised 4% more money. Do it again." And you go, "Wow, okay. Phew." And you go out and you raise everything you've raised before, plus 4% more, and you do it again. And then at the end of the year, we come and we go, "That was so great.
Here's a pizza party for everything you did. Do it again." And it's not sustainable. You can't work at, at that level long-term. Mm-hmm. So instead, I'm like, "What does your mission need to get there?" Mm-hmm. So if you're serving 500 children in your county, I say, "How many children in your county need your services?"
And they go, "Okay, 1,500." I'm like, "Okay, so you're at 500, the need is 1,500. There's two ways to look at this, or maybe two ways and then an in-between way. If you are helping 500 children that otherwise wouldn't be helped, then good for you. That's fantastic. You stay right there. You are doing a great job."
And comma, what if you wanted to do all 1,500? And if you wanted to do all 1,500, what would that make your organization look like? You would have to raise perhaps three times as much money. You would have to have three times as much staff, things like that. You can't 4% your way from 500 kids to 1,500 kids.
Growth doesn't happen evenly. You might have a, a point where you have to put in a whole nother person. You may have to add staff in chunks, or you may have to move to another building or add a site or something, and those happen in chunks. So when you're looking at something strategically, I wanna say, "Okay, where are you now and where do you wanna be?"
Then you build your budget and your development plan and your fundraising plan to get there, and that's when you pack the car. I said so many times we're like, "Oh, we're going to California. Okay, I'm gonna pack a bathing suit and my skis." Well, I don't know if, if we're gonna swim or sit on the beach or if we're gonna snow ski.
Mm. So you've gotta make a plan to get there, otherwise you're packing all this stuff before you've even, before you even know where you're going. So I'm flipping around on different analogies. But- Yeah ... I, I love the concept of having this, understanding where you are now, understanding where it is you wanna be, and then making a plan to get there.
So in the... What I'm designing right now is a development planning tool where you go in and you say, "Okay, this is where I wanna... This is where we are. This is where we wanna be. And so now we're gonna map out we're, how we're gonna get there. And are we gonna lean into events? Are we gonna lean into major donors?"
Major donors is a lot of time the answer. Mm-hmm. Um, are we gonna meet in, lean into collective donors? Are we gonna le- lead into earned income, or are we gonna lead into grants? Mm. What is gonna be the way? And then divide and conquer. We set a goal for each of those, and then we try to achieve that goal.
Instead of, "Oh, let's just go out and ask people for money." Mm. And, and so that's the approach that I think we miss sometimes. We tend to promote people into the development role in nonprofits, especially the smaller nonprofits, that love the organization and have no development experience. Mm. So they don't know how to even design this plan.
They don't know how to make an ask. Mm. We go through that. We teach that process. They don't know... They've n- they may or may not have done it a lot of times. They don't know what to do if they get a no. Mm. Nos are okay. It's okay. Yeah. You just maintain the relationship. They don't know how to manage a relationship so that the donor feels engaged when they're not giving.
There's nothing worse than realizing you haven't talked to a donor in 11 months, and it's time to ask them for your, their annual gift. And if I were that donor, I'd be like, "Well, you only come to me when you want something." So how do we engage that donor throughout the year so that we don't wind up in December, or whenever that is, and ask and, and like, "Oh, I'm here with my hand out again."
Right. So building that system and putting that system in place, you don't have the bandwidth to think about it every day. So you put the system in place, and that's what I'm hoping that this will do for people, is give them a way to make a system that, that they can use to follow this through every year.
Chris: Having been in an organization that has challenges with fundraising, having seen that up close, I know exactly the challenge that you're talking about. And it can be hard when you're fundraising to really find the right audience, the right people to talk to. So yeah, I think I love that idea of, like, the way you're talking about making it about really a, a strategy, and really thinking about the people you're trying to reach too.
That's, I don't know if that was intentional in what you were saying or not, I'm assuming it was. But where, where you said, you know, thinking about the people you wanna reach first helps as well, 'cause just saying, "Oh, we put a new number out there to go after," I mean, how do you communicate that to a staff?
How do you communicate that to an organization? I mean, that's, that's eventually just gonna become an arbitrary thing that you've gotta do every year. That becomes a perpetual... If you can't make it move, you're gonna fail. Right. And you're just setting yourself up for that future failure. 'Cause 4% now is 8%.
You know, if you do that every year- Right ... that's 8%, 12%- Right ... 16, and- Right, and it's
Mary: compounding- Yes ... so
Chris: it
Mary: just gets bigger and bigger.
Chris: Yes.
Mary: I, I think a lot of times nonprofits are so mission-focused- Mm-hmm ... which is what they're supposed to be. Right. So go, go nonprofits. Very, very mission-focused, that they tend to forget that they've got to have the resources in place to do it.
And so they're always working hand-to-mouth. They're always worried about where the next dollar's coming from so that they can serve the next person. Mm-hmm. And by going back and looking at this from a 30,000-foot view and say, you're going, look, you have got to, you may have to spend time, effort, and resources on building resources.
Mm-hmm. And, and that's hard to do, because then it's like, I wanna take everything we make and I wanna help the, the people. Right. Or, or the animals, or the whatever you're doing. And, and you wanna do that. Well, and that's so admirable and so amazing. And that's not necessarily the best way to run an organization.
Mm-hmm. So a lot of times I'll come in and I'll find an organization where the ED, the executive director, the ED, is primarily mission-focused. Mm-hmm. And they're out raising money, perhaps some. You've got a program manager, you've got an office manager, you've got other people that do things. I'm like, who's raise, who is in charge of raising the money?
Well, the ED is. It's really hard for an ED to split their world- into raising money and delivering mission. It's just a really hard thing to do. And a lot of times I will argue for hire somebody for development. Mm-hmm. "Well, we can't afford to." I'm like, "Okay, I'm just gonna tell you right now, if a good development director can't raise their own salary in three months, you need to kick them to the curb."
Yeah. And I'm probably harsh that way, but, like, it's, it's a budget friendly position. Mm-hmm. It's a sales position. They should be bringing in plenty of revenue- Mm ... to offset not only their own salary, but to support the organization. And, and if you have them 100% focused on raising money And they don't get pulled off into, "Oh, well, they're gonna go help do this, and they're gonna go..."
No, you keep them 100% focused in raising money. Then now you've got that revenue coming in. The resources an organization needs are basically money, time, and people, and money arguably purchases the other two. So you, you've got to have that fundraising coming in to support the mission. And once I can kind of get a board or an ED to think about it that way, it's like m- raising money is not a bad thing.
It's not an evil thing. It is a, a good, positive thing, and it's gonna support your organization. You have to pay attention to it. And that sort of, uh, and that aha moment is, I love it. I just, I'm like, yes. And the, "Oh, we need a hard development director." And I'm like, "Yes, you do. Yes, you do." It's hard to do, and you're gonna have to put a little money up front to get them started, 'cause they're not gonna bring in $30,000 the first day.
But let's talk about it. Let's set up what their goals should be. Let's set up, uh, how they're gonna go about it, and let's make sure they have the support in place. There might be some internal systems they need to have in place to do their job, but it should be budget friendly.
Chris: I think that fundraising is often overlooked or too...
It, it's, it feels like it's either one or the other. It's either completely overlooked in an organization, or it's so heavily focused on that it becomes all the organization ends up being about. And at least it's my experience. I remember, I, early on, actually that first startup I was a part of, we did work for a, and I'm not gonna name names here, but there was a nonprofit in town that I actually got on the board of.
Like, we had done work with them. They were a client, and they were like, "Can you be on our board, too?" I was like, "Yeah, sure, I'll be on the board." But I was on the board with, like, 30 other people. Or at least maybe 60. And I'll never forget, like, they had a leadership change. A new staff guy came in, or a new, new ED came in, and all of a sudden he was doing the fundraising, and he was pushing everybody on the board off, and he was like...
And at the time, like, the company I was a part of, the startup that I had started, like, just didn't work out. We, we were winding down, so I was like, "I quit." Like, "I can't be a part of this board with what you're expecting. I'm sorry." But I just remember that whole crazy situation, and the weirdest thing was just showing up and realizing, like, there was a board, and then there was a board within a board.
And it was like, how does this really even work if there's so many people on the board? So that just kind of leads into, like, I, I think what you, uh, mentioned earlier, boards behaving badly. Yes. Um, so tell me- Yes ... more about that and, and those, those
Mary: challenges. And, uh, and, and I, I jokingly talk about that because it, it alliterates, and it's, it's fun to say.
But a lot of people that join, join Governing boards Mm-hmm ... not advisory boards, but governing boards, don't fully understand their purpose and, and their responsibility, and they don't necessarily understand the balance- Mm ... that has to happen- Mm ... um, between the board and the ED. The governing board is fiscally responsible for the organization.
Mm-hmm. They are responsible for the money. They're responsible for how it's used. They're responsible for if it's used legally. They're responsible for all of these things. They're responsible for setting a strategic plan for the organization. Mm. The ED is responsible for the dai- daily operations of the nonprofit.
So you've got the micromanaging board, which tries to get in the ED's business and tell them what to do all the time, which is not appropriate, but then sometimes you have the rubber stamp board, that's just like the ED comes in and goes, "Okay, we're going to, uh, we're- we're painting the building pink," and they go, "Okay, sounds good."
Um, "Okay, we're spending, uh, $20,000 on this," and they go, "Okay, sounds good." And they're not doing their job either. Yeah. And it's a weird situation because the ED reports to the board collectively- Mm ... not to any one board member, but to the whole board. And so the board may only meet, let's say they meet once a month for an hour.
So and let's say the ED works 40 hours a week. Most of them work more than that, but let's say they work 40 hours a week. They've worked 160 hours between board meetings, and then the board comes in and spends an hour. Mm. And then he works 100 o- 160 hours again, and then the board m- So the ED is much more knowledge about the daily operations and what's going on in the climate or surrounding the nonprofit, but yet reports to the board that doesn't have that knowledge.
The board's usually, uh, almost always volunteers, and then if they come and help at something, say they come and help at a fundraiser or something like that, now they're serving in a different role. They're serving in a volunteer role for the e- event. They're not in charge then. And it's really hard sometimes to get that dynamic correct.
It's not very efficient dynamic. In for-profits, you typically have the head person and then the people under it. It kind of stretches out like a pyramid. In a nonprofit, you have the ED kind of in the middle between the board and the staff, and it's not, it's not terribly efficient. Decision-making takes a long time.
If the ED wants to do something major, he's got to, he or she has to sell that to the board, i- if you will. They have to, uh, get consensus on it. It takes time. They don't meet every, but so every so often, so it's a longer process, and, and that's good. That's why it's set up that way, to make sure that no one's taking control of this public entity, basically.
But it takes longer, and so managing that dynamic is where I get into a lot of, a lot of things. I've unfortunately dealt with a board recently, it's not in East Tennessee, it's in another area, that there were about three people on the board that were controlling the communication to the rest of the board, and one of those people was the treasurer, and she was not interested in having a finance committee, even though that was in their bylaws.
And the ED kept going to her and saying, "We're gonna run out of money." The board passed a deficit budget, which meant they were going to bring... They were expecting to spend more than they brought in. And they were gonna hit that deficit in about February of the, of the year, and this was probably July. And they had no reserve, so they would be in deficit situation.
And the, um, treasurer refused to let that information go through to the board. And I got called in, and we tried bringing in an attorney. We tried bringing in someone from the national organization, the oversight org- we, we tried these different things and, and were kinda pooh-pooh'd and, and no, no, what, uh, what happened.
And so sure enough, in February of... It's been a few years now. Um, they ran out of money. Mm. And, and when I had gone in, I said, "You have to understand that you as the board are fiscally responsible for this organization. So if it goes under, if- if you can't make payroll, your ED goes away, your staff goes away, and you as a board are gonna be responsible for paying your creditors, for, for selling the building and put- giving the assets to another nonprofit, for government contracts that you have in place."
Yeah. Um, you're responsible for that, and grantors and all this. Um, and they're, "No, we're not. No, we're not." Mm. You know, "It's the ED's problem." I'm like, "No, it's not, 'cause she'll be gone," you know? And, and we went through all that process, and sure enough, in February, they got to the point where they couldn't make payroll, and we had to finally just, uh...
The board ended up resigning. Those three people ended up resigning, and they kind of took the rest of the board with them. And, um, it was unfortunate, but we got a new board installed, and we had a benefactor that was willing to come forth and support the organization, and it's back on its feet and doing well.
Uh, but those are, those are the hard ones. And, and it was ugly, and it was, and it was unfortunate for some of the board members that had no idea what was going on. Mm-hmm. They, they just weren't aware. But it was good. And, and ultimately, the individuals that that nonprofit served had no break in service.
That's good. And that was probably my biggest happy, happy moment is we had no break in service. Yeah. That was amazing.
Chris: It's always hard when you can't make payroll or handle things like that, and it's always embarrassing as a board when you have that failure. So I, I totally understand the need to, you know, change over the board and make- Mm
make changes like that. What do you, what do you see as, like, some of the other challenges the boards face outside of, like, maybe financial mismanagement? Like, what are some common mistakes that they make?
Mary: A lot of it is that there is change. I don't think it's necessarily even... There's change in how nonprofits are perceived.
There's change in how nonprofits are being dealt with from, from a government level. And, and there's changes in how donors feel about nonprofits, and I don't think that's anything new or particular to, to this year or this administration or anything like that. I think it kinda waxes and wanes. Uh, uh, I guess I've been around long enough that I've seen it go in a lot of different ways.
Mm. But sometimes a board starts to think that it's always gonna be the way it has been. And we've always done it that way, and I'm very happy with the way it was done. It's been done for 20 years, and I'm not a person the board member might think, I'm not an agent of change, so I'm not gonna change it.
It's gonna be too much work, so I'm just gonna let it go on and then, and it, and they don't make change early enough. I look at COVID. The organizations that succeeded during COVID were the ones that went, "Wait a minute, this is gonna be longer than two weeks, and I've got to do something to serve our clientele and, and our individuals with what's happening right now."
I worked with a performance organization. They can't have performances because you can't have, can't be in a theater. You can't do those things. They pivoted immediately, and I'm really tired of the word pivot, but I've just used it. But they, they did. They changed immediately, and they said, "Okay, we can't do this, so we're gonna do it a different way."
And they went to offering outside performances at a very small level. They were free. They said, "We're just gonna do it for free. We're not gonna try to make money doing it, and, uh, but we're just... and we're gonna c- continue to employ the performers because they need work." And so it was just a... But they did it immediately.
And then I see other organizations that were just like, "We're gonna wait it out. We're not gonna go to our donors because we can't ask them for money if, if we're not doing anything." Well, then their donors have moved on. They quit offering their services, which means other organizations have come in and filled the gap.
They didn't emerge from COVID as healthy as they went into it And so I think a lot of times that is a board issue, where the board is not ready to make that strategic decision, a hard decision on cutting services or changing services, or figuring out a new way to do something, or even closing if an organization...
There, sometimes an organization needs to close. It's not as efficient as other organizations that are doing the same thing. It's, it doesn't have a lot of, uh, people within it that are ready to make those changes. It needs to close. That's fine. It's perfectly fine. It's not a failure. They've done a great thing.
Their season is over. Uh, but instead of planning to close, they just keep going and keep going till, ah, and everybody has their hair on fire. And you can plan to close, and it's a, it's a lovely thing. Um, you close, and you have a, a nice dinner, and you congratulate yourself for all the good you did in the world, and you move on to your next chapter.
Yeah. And so I've, I'm actually closing, helping an organization close right now, and their founding director passed away, and they just never picked it back up. And it's been doing great work, but they're like, "There's somebody else that can do this better." They've joined up with another organization.
They're gonna pass the torch to them, and it's lovely.
Chris: That's wise. The antithesis of that is just waiting until everything fails, like you said. And yeah, sometimes nonprofits just need to go a certain way because a founder moved on or something like that. Mm-hmm. They do that. Or they're
Mary: Blockbuster.
Chris: Yeah.
Mary: And, and- Or they're Blockbuster.
Chris: That... Good
Mary: point ... and, and the way they're delivering the services and their entire infrastructure is set up to deliver services in a certain way that's just not realistic anymore. So are they gonna reinvent, or are they going to, uh... And sometimes you get ego involved in that.
Chris: Nobody wants to be a failure.
Mary: Right.
Chris: Nobody wants to close down a business.
Mary: Right. Or, and, and they're thinking, "Oh, oh, I don't wanna change. I don't wanna be, I don't wanna be the person that does this." And so when the ego's involved, it's, it's harder to, to just say, "It's okay. It's okay. And, um, we don't have to be the biggest, the best.
We don't have to exist in two years. But let's do it smartly. Let's, let's go out wisely and calmly and without our hair on fire." Yeah. Absolutely.
Chris: As we talk about boards, as we talk about nonprofits and everything, obviously you're doing this through Leafspring. Tell me more about the name. Where did Leafspring-
come from? What inspired you for that?
Mary: Okay. Well, first I brought my mascot with me.
Chris: Oh,
Mary: excellent. Um, this is Larry. Um- Oh ... he is my, is my mascot, so I have to bring him. That's a, it's a marketing, branding kind of gimmick. Fantastic. But, uh, did bring him with me today. So Leaf- Thank
Chris: you for joining us, Larry,
Mary: by the way.
Oh, yes. Yes. Thank you, Larry. And Larry will get a special watering tonight too, for his, for his service. Yeah. So Leafspring, leaf and spring, new life, growth, things like this. But I think I mentioned I was in the automotive industry. A leaf spring is part of the chassis of a vehicle, like a truck, that helps the rider not feel all the bumps in the road.
It helps support the road to, so the ride is smoother. Mm-hmm. And when I kind of fell into that because I was actually doing the trademark search, like who has... Oh, somebody's got that one. You know, I'm, I'm going through there and, and it just kind of popped. It was just one of those moments. I was like, "Oh my gosh, this, this works."
Mm-hmm. And so w- uh, a leaf spring physically has nothing to do with my business, but it, it, it kind of works, so I've kept it. I
Chris: mean, yeah, physically no. Mm-hmm. But symbolically, absolutely.
Mary: And, and it is a nod to the family business that had been around for, I think we were the fourth generation in it, and, um- Can
Chris: I ask what that company was?
Mary: Sure, yeah. We were, we were with Reader Chevrolet.
Chris: Oh, okay. Yeah,
Mary: yeah. And, um, and, uh, we sold it in, or sold the primary business in 2004. But there's a lot of things that go into that. There's a leasing company and a reinsurance company and a, and a ad agency and all these things that you have to have to, to do that.
My great-grandfather started it in 1912.
Chris: Quite the, uh, quite the journey.
Mary: Yes.
Chris: Yeah.
Mary: Yes. He was on State Street, and he owned a livery stable, which for those of you that don't know what livery is, it's horse and buggy. Wow. And so he was in the transportation business and started selling Studebakers in 1912, so.
Chris: Yeah. He was one of the early adopters.
Mary: Um, I think he, he was just looking for, uh, what's, what's next or, or what would supplement. And then I had... He was also a huge promoter And in the time of when, when promoting something and big and huge and getting the News Sentinel and the Journal at the time to come and cover everything, and, and he, he did a lot of that.
So the '20s, I think, were, were a big time for him as well. There's some great stories from that, but for another day.
Chris: That is really cool. I, I kinda wanna dig into that now- ... that you've, you've brought all that up, 'cause that's a part of Knoxville's history, and- Mm-hmm ... you know, an interesting aspect on it too, because it's car dealerships when cars were still, you know, being formed and the roads were being built.
I actually did a whole podcast on roads in Tennessee. So I've, I've been a part of that and talked to people at the highest levels of road construction here in town, and... Not here in town, here in, here in the state level. Mm-hmm. And it's a fascinating journey that our state went through to go from dirt roads that got muddy and, and, you know, bogged down to where we're at today.
But yeah, seeing that and then hearing the car side of it, I'm like, "Ooh, there's a, there's a story there. There's, there's something really
Mary: cool." There's a lot there. I mean, there's like, during World War II- Mm-hmm ... you
Chris: know,
Mary: wh- when cars were in a little low supply, and then during the Depression, how did they get through that?
And there are tons of, of old stories. I wrote a gigantic paper on it at one point in college and had to go back and interview all the folks that were involved in that, and found the old pictures. And, and, and it just gave me a huge appreciation for kind of where I'd come from in that, in that realm. And so, you know, I tell people, "I was a car dealer."
Mm. You know, you can hate me now, but that's- ... that's what I did. I know it's not most- not the most glamorous or sometimes well thought of profession, but I learned so much from it. And honestly, Knoxville's a pretty clean car town. Yeah. Um, there's, there's not a lot of, at least when I was involved, there, it, it, we- wasn't, there wasn't a lot of bad stuff going on like there are in some markets.
So pretty clean car town, a lot of old families that have been involved for a long time, and they're, they've got the long-term view.
Chris: I've had the good fortune to meet the West family- Mm ... and the Harpers and-
Mary: Oh,
Chris: yeah ... some, some of those folks. And I will, I will say, I've never had a bad experience with the major dealerships in town.
Harper specifically, I'm a, I'm an Acura guy, so they've worked really hard to improve their reputation- Mm ... just as a, as a company as a whole, and then their Acura team is just fantastic. Oh, awesome. I'm a huge fan. That's awesome. So I would comfortably agree with you- Yeah, yeah ... and say
Mary: it's a clean- I mean, and it's-
clean town ... you know, and people would, you know, I'd see them run from me at the grocery store 'cause they bought a Ford. I'm like, "I don't sell Fords. That's fine. If you want a Chevrolet, I hope you, hope you at least give me a call, give me a chance." But it's, it's pretty good car town, and, and, and the demand here is pretty even.
Mm-hmm. We don't have the ups and downs like some other cities do, 'cause we're more insulated with the hospitals and the university here. Oh, yeah. So we have a lot of, uh, of s- stability in- Absolutely ... that does, so it doesn't go up and down like crazy, which it does in some places. Mm-hmm. Uh, but we did, I mean, there was a huge car strike.
We didn't have any product. So we started selling watermelons, and we did it as a joke. We already had a contract with the Knoxville News Sentinel for a certain amount of ad, of ad space, and so we're like, "Well, we gotta use it, so let's just put watermelons in it." And we just kinda turned it loose, and everybody got into it, and we sold them, you know, green exterior, red interior- Mm-hmm
fully seated- ... flow-through air. Mm-hmm. You know, all the things. Pinstri- we put a pinstripe on it, and it, it... Well, the AP picked it up. Mm-hmm. And we, and we got interviews. People started calling in, and, and they were $3 apiece, and the salesman got a dollar of it, and y- you know, we just made the whole big thing.
We put the big truck out on the front of Clinton Highway and had all the watermelons in it and everything. And well, we got a call from, like, the BBC. It was like, oh my gosh, our, our campaign went international. Wasn't even planned. It was just, it was viral before there was viral. And we got picked up on all that, and we just had a good time with it, but you gotta roll with what you, what you've got.
Yeah. And financially, going back to that, the boring stuff, you gotta have the reserves there to withstand that kind of thing. Right. And pulling it totally back around to my nonprofits- Mm-hmm ... I say, look, you never know when the next COVID, the next strike, the next- Right ... thing is gonna be, and you have to have the reserves in place.
You have to have that ready to go. A- a- and I guess I just learned that through all the up and down times that we had with the car business is, is you, you learn that. My dad was kind of a Biblical guy. He also was amazingly hysterical, but he, he would say, "Seven years of plenty, seven years of famine." And he would say that, and we'd be like, "Okay, so just because it's good now doesn't mean it's gonna be good later."
Right. "And just 'cause it's bad now doesn't mean it's gonna be bad later." So it's that perspective.
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Mary: to get started today
Chris: Yeah. It's very prudent to put yourself in a place where you have the reserves to make it through the famine, to make it through the, the harder times. And yeah, I mean, the, for nonprofits, I would imagine this n- last year has probably been quite the challenge- Mm ... just with everything happening at a governmental level and DOGE and all of that, and, you know, random fundings just getting canceled for, as we have seen, I don't know if you've followed any of that.
A little. But the, um- ... 404 Media, by the way, side note for anybody, check 'em out. They're awesome. They did an incredible report on the, the DOGE deposition videos, where they wa- watched every single hour of it, and pulled all the highlights and all the interesting stuff, and you start to see some of that logic that they used, or illogic, if you will, that was used to make those decisions.
And, and try, I'm not trying to get political here, but it's crazy, and I'm sure that had a huge impact on some of these local nonprofits. I remember we were even talking about one for our business, or talking to one for our business to help with, and they just ghosted us out of the blue, just... And I'm sure it had to do with, like, financial changes and things like that, just with funding and government grants and stuff.
So yeah, it's a wild time right now. It,
Mary: it is wild. And the organizations that are more flexible, that have, have the reserve- Mm-hmm ... in place... Well, let's talk about reserves for a second. You have to have reserves, because you don't know what's coming. It, just like you, you wouldn't run your life if you had a choice without a savings account, without, you know, the s- the, the people say you should have 60 to 90 days or six months- Right
or whatever it is, you know, to, to, to back you up. And nonprofits are the same way, because you don't know what's coming and you don't know what's gonna happen. You also wanna diversify your income, your revenue. So if you're completely grant funded, then if grants go away, so do you. So what can you do to diversify that funding base so that you're not so critically involved?
Donors, at least for the organizations that I work with, and I mostly work with organizations in East Tennessee. I have some clients elsewhere, but it's just, uh, that's how the referral base has worked. Most of them, their donors hang in with them. They're like, "Oh, you're having trouble. I'm, I'm, I'm gonna still support you."
So that's the positive thing about having a strong major donor base that you continue to engage and keep involved in your organization so they understand and they're willing to help you through difficult times. But a lot of these nonprofits, especially the smaller ones, tend to live, like I said, hand to mouth.
So as soon as they get the money in, they wanna spend it. And some people think, "Oh, I can't make a profit. I can't have r- extra reserves 'cause I'm a non-profit." And I often kinda quip with them, I'll say, "Well, a non-profit is a, a tax status, not a business plan." Mm-hmm. So we want to have at least 90 days, hopefully 180 days of cash.
And when you get to a certain point, you invest that so that you are, the money is earning, and then you, y- you don't wanna keep everything you make, but you, y- 'cause you wanna do your mission, but you have to build that long-term stability. Mm-hmm. Because when you have problems, typically that's also when your clientele is having issues.
So you've got to be stable for, for them, um, especially if you're in the social enterprise area. So let- let's build you up so that you can be that solid rock foundation for these, for your constituents when, when that happens. One of the biggest things we ran into most recently was not necessarily funding getting cut, but funding getting delayed.
A lot of government grants work, they give you the grant, which means they tell you you're going to get it, but then you have to perform everything using the money that you have, and then you, you b- you get reimbursed. And so most government grants are reimbursement grants, which is fine as long as everything's flowing.
Mm-hmm. But when the government shuts down for several months, what happens is that funding gets delayed. Mm-hmm. So let's say that you worked from the beginning of January '25 through September '25. Mm-hmm. You spent $250,000 doing whatever it was, and you send your, all your, your information back into your agency, your government agency, and say, "We've done this.
Here's our proof. We did what we're supposed to do." Fantastic, and then the government shuts down. Mm-hmm. And they don't get that $250,000 back until December, January, February. Now they have a cash flow problem, and cash flow will kill you. Uh, uh, in small business, in, in nonprofit, it'll kill you in a second.
So now you've got people rushing to get lines of credit, and they're going to donors, and they're having to have these oh my gosh moments with donors, which is never a good thing. So building reserves kind of helps that, but that's, that's an issue is, is when you don't get that money in time. And it's money you've earned.
It's reve- it's revenue technically, but you don't have the cash, and that's a tough one. That, that's probably one of the hardest ones to, to work around. And if, if a grant completely gets canceled, you at least know that up front- Mm-hmm ... before you spend the money. A huge change in a donor base will do that as well, but we don't, we don't really have that volatile of a donor base here in Knoxville, so that's not as big a deal.
But that, that government funding getting delayed like that was a, was a big problem for a lot of people.
Chris: Yeah. Oh, I, I can imagine, and seems like anymore, like anything government related's gonna be somewhat uncertain in the moment. But with that, with the challenges, I mean, like you said, Knoxville, Knoxville's very interesting with nonprofits from my understanding.
We have a lot of nonprofits, more than most cities, and we also have, at least per capita I've heard, and then also, yeah, like you said, the donor base is really big here. So yeah, there's a lot of generous people in this town.
Mary: There really are, and there are just so many... I mean, you've got, uh, you know, several families that have supported The nonprofit world in the, in East Tennessee forever and ever.
Those families may or may not continue that, but it's a very generous area. You, you said something about having a lot of nonprofits- Mm ... and that's something that's interesting. The explosion in the number of nonprofits in the last probably 10 to 15 years- Mm-hmm ... is really interesting. And I had a professor tell me one time at UT, Alex Miller, I don't know if you know him, but he's kind of the nonprofit guru of the university, and he told me, or told a class that I was helping teach and I was listening, and he was saying that if you choose a certain area of town in Knoxville, and he named it, but I can't remember where it was, so I don't wanna guess.
He said there are 500 separate nonprofits that claim to be in the food scarcity space on that block. I'm sitting there thinking to myself, w- do we have the ham and cheese ministry, the p- Mm ... pimento cheese ministry, and the chicken soup ministry? What are we doing? And he said, "We have a lot of nonprofits trying to do the same thing."
And there is a tendency to, "Oh, let's go start a nonprofit," when sometimes your idea might be better served as a program of a larger nonprofit, because there are economies to scale for this thing. And so starting a small nonprofit and struggling and struggling and struggling i- is not always the best plan.
And so nonprofits sometimes fail. Smaller nonprofits sometimes fail for that reason. But sometimes there are nonprofits out there doing that very thing. You just may not know about it. So I have a lot of people that will come to me and say, "I'm thinking about starting a nonprofit." And I, and I do a couple of things.
A first thing I do is I say, "Well, who else is doing this?" And, "Uh, I don't know." I'm like, "Okay, here's your homework. You know, we're gonna make a business plan. And so who's doing it already? What is your competitive analysis? Who's doing it already? How, how would you fund this? Who are you gonna serve? Define who you're gonna serve.
Define what the needs are. Define how your program is going to fulfill those needs, and tell me how that's better than what somebody else is doing." Mm-hmm. Really get them thinking. Mm. And if they take that and come back, then I'm like, "Okay, I got something solid," because now they're thinking about it, and now they're doing it.
A lot of times I'll give people that homework, and they take it, and I don't hear from them again. But they take it, and they come back, then we keep going, and we said, "Okay, what's your niche gonna be? What... How are you going to do something better, and how are you going to show with metrics or, or that what you're doing is effective?"
And I said, "You know, you, you've gotta quantify your mission." For example, let's say you wanna be in the hunger space. Mm. One mission or one purpose would be to meet people where they are when they're hungry, and that's your proverbial soup kitchen. These are hungry people. They need to be fed right now.
They have an immediate emergency-type need. That's easy to measure. How many mouths did you feed? How many meals did you provide? W- whatever. But what if we're gonna solve hunger? So you're gonna... Instead of just, just feed... I say just not because it's incon- inconsequential, but it's... So instead of feeding people- Mm
we're going to solve hunger. Well, that's a whole societal, cultural issue that we're facing. We, we've gotta support the family. They might need education. They might need h- housing. They might need... We, we don't... I mean, that's a much bigger thing. How do you measure that, and what kind of timeframe are you gonna measure that on?
So you've gotta decide what you're doing. Are you f- feeding the hungry, or are you solving hunger? Mm-hmm. And, and that mission clarity will get you a long way to understanding what kind of organization you have to be. And then another thing I ask them is, "What position are you gonna hold?" in this organization."
And they'll go, "I'm gonna be the executive director." I'm like, "Congratulations, you report to a board." So you may have all of the great ideas and amazing passion and all of this stuff, and you're gonna report to a board who may or may not share that with you and who can fire you. And it is not unusual for a founding executive director to be let go by their board 10, 15 years down the road Because the same person that's the entrepreneurial nonprofit starter-upper- Mm-hmm
may not be the person that can take them to the next level. And so I said, you know, for me, if I was going to start a nonprofit, I would like to be the chairman of the board, because that is the position of power, if you will. Not that I'm all power hungry about it. Right. But that's the position of, of... But you can't get paid- Mm
being, uh, the, the director of the board. So that, it's a, it's a tough thing to figure out, and I said, "You've got to understand that if you start this and you put all this blood, sweat, and tears into it, you may not be the person that finishes it out." Yeah. And, and it's just a reality that, that happens. So, but anyway, I've, we've started a couple and, um, it's, they've been successful.
We try to set them on, like, "We need to do this in year one. You can't do 70 things at once." Yeah. "You can do about four." Mm-hmm. "So let's do these four things, and then we'll move on and do these four things, and these four things," and like I said, I just, I love it. I just get excited thinking about it.
Chris: Yeah.
So. It's, I mean, that, that's awesome, and I, I love that, like, you're, you're taking a very practical approach to it, I think, with asking people to really think about what they're doing, you know, building from a place of, you know, positioning themselves in the right way. 'Cause as many nonprofits as we have here, like, okay, cool.
You're starting a nonprofit. Mm-hmm. Neat. Everybody else has one.
Mary: Yes.
Chris: Not really, but-
Mary: No, but I, yeah. There's a lot of them.
Chris: You know what I'm saying. There's a lot, and so I think forcing people to think about it's always a good thing. I mean, we, we do that with our business, because, you know, how many podcasts are there out there?
There's a lot of them, and there's a lot of dead ones too. And, you know, you, you don't wanna tread on toes, you don't wanna be sued, you don't wanna do something that somebody's already done, and how do you bring a unique voice to it? Mm-hmm. And I think with nonprofits it's the same thing. Trying to bring a unique voice to something and, and not treading on toes or having territory wars.
I mean, you're, you're in it to help people. Right. You shouldn't be fighting other people locally for resources or money or donations. Yeah. You should be in a space that people feel like, "I'm not just giving to the fifth organization to do the same thing in-" Right ... you know, two years or whatnot." Mm-hmm.
Mary: Yes, and there, there may actually be, heaven forbid I say this, there may actually be too many nonprofits.
And it may be that over time, this ac- acceleration that we're seeing in the number of nonprofits may actually go back down, because I don't know that it's sustainable. But that's, that's a problem for another person with a much bigger picture than, than I have. But, um, I wonder- Sure ... if it's sustainable.
And, and I, and I tell people that when they talk to me about starting one. And that's, I'm not trying to throw water on your fire here, but, but it may not be sustainable.
Chris: Yeah. The inverse of that's what I see in the media world a lot, which is- I wanna do video production for nonprofits. Mm-hmm. And the number of organizations that I've run into that say, "I wanna work with nonprofits and do that for nonprofits," I'm always like, "That's admirable, but, like, what are you...
Like, how does that different from doing any other business?" And I don't know, I've always found it really interesting that that's another common, like, supporting cottage industries for, um, nonprofits is also a business in and of itself, if that makes sense. But I don't know, I've just, I've run into a lot of video production folks that are like, "We do this with nonprofits."
I'm like- Yeah ... "Okay, cool. Good for you."
Mary: One of the things that I've done, I think I've done it two or three times now, is I've actually helped businesses That are B2B- Mm-hmm ... that work with other businesses understand nonprofits and figure out how to work with them. 'Cause remember I said that the decision process is very slow?
But it's also slow on the other end. Like, if you can get their business, it's, it's harder to lose because th- that process is so slow. Yeah. So, um, I was working with a marketing company one time, and they had nonprofit clients, and they were just like, "I'm so frustrated with them 'cause they won't get back to me."
And I'm like, "They gotta take everything to a committee, and that committee is made of volunteers who may or may not be available to meet for three weeks. And, and so your timeline may have to be different." 'Cause this particular company prided themselves in turning something around really quickly, and I said, "I don't think they care."
Mm-hmm. So if you're going to work with nonprofits, you may need to change that model. Right. And you may have to allow for multiple decision-makers. You may have to allow for this consensus-building to happen. Uh, and I said y- and that if I'm coaching you as a business that's working with nonprofits, insist on one point of communication.
You still have to deal with other people, but insist on one point because that's gonna force them to give you one point. Understand that some of the terminology that you use for for-profits is scary in nonprofits. They don't like to hear about profit. They like to hear about revenue. They don't like to hear about marketing.
They like to hear about PR. They don't want... Y- So, so you may have to change your lingo a little bit- Mm ... to, to attract some of the nonprofit world. Just as you would if you were gonna s- focus on healthcare or you're gonna focus on another industry. You have to understand how their decision-making works and be able to, to model to that.
And so I've helped a couple of just for-profit companies kind of work through that, what's that gonna look like if I'm gonna deal with nonprofits?
Chris: Yeah, it's a different world. I've worked with nonprofits off and on, on the business side as well, and seen exactly what you're talking about with the time it takes to make a decision and get back and, you know, just as a s- the salesperson in me is always thinking, like, "What's your decision-making process like?"
Yes. And asking that up front so that- Mm-hmm ... you know what to expect and-
Mary: Exactly ...
Chris: um-
Mary: Exactly ...
Chris: and just make sure you're not gonna harass them too frequently about-
Mary: Right ...
Chris: when's the decision gonna be made? When's the decision-
Mary: When can I know? ... gonna get made? And, uh- Yeah ... and if you're, if you're on any kind of, um, of sales quota, it's harder because it's gonna take longer.
And, and if you're- Sales manager doesn't, your boss, your sales manager doesn't understand that you've got that situation, then they may be kicking you to say, "Hey, why can't you close this deal?" Like, well, it- it's a nonprofit deal, and it's gonna take three months instead of one month or something. But like I said, they're probably not gonna kick you out as quickly either, because the decision on the other side, if they, if you make a mistake, there's not one person that's gonna go, "Oh, yeah, you're, you're out of here."
That, again, has gotta go through. So you've got time to remedy your error or whatever the relationship issue is that ... And most nonprofits are generally pretty, uh, "Okay, okay, just fix it." Yeah. You know? And we're, and we're good.
Chris: Yeah. You're there to help them in a way that they can't. And I think that a lot of times, once you get in and develop a good relationship, you're right, you have that long-term extended relationship, and it's always really positive.
And that's what we've seen for the most part, is you get in good with a nonprofit, and they're gonna rely on you for things, and they may even start relying on you for more things, 'cause they realize, "Oh, you can also do that. Oh, and you could help us with this, and if we wanted to go this direction," you know?
And so it becomes a very, they can be very fruitful. So I, I get the value in working with them, and I enjoy working with them. I always ... You can tell me if I'm right on this or not, but I always tell people, "Don't immediately discount your services for a nonprofit just because they're a nonprofit either, or at least don't give away everything for free."
I think that's the propensity, and that's what I always get concerned with when people say they work with nonprofits, is are you operating at a lower budget level- Mm-hmm ... just to work with a nonprofit? Sometimes you have to. Sometimes you have to. And sometimes it's okay. Yeah. But just going at it first and being like, "Here's a, you know, free, free year of service"- Right
you know, without thinking how it's, what's in it for you or how it would benefit, I think a lot of people get just caught up in serving and helping, which is good, but without thinking about the business side of it, if you will. I hope that doesn't sound too callous. I'm not trying to make it that
Mary: way. No.
No, not at all. And I, and on some levels, you get what you pay for. Mm-hmm. And, and so unless you have a ... You're, you're basically asking Uh, a nonprofit in this position is asking someone for a donation. They're basically asking for a reduction in service costs or, or more services for free. It- that's a donation, because the market value of that product is higher.
Mm-hmm. So it is an in-kind donation. And I'll talk to my nonprofits, says, "You gotta look at it this way. So if you don't have a relationship with this organization," uh, like say it's you, okay? And I say, "You don't have a relationship with HumblePod. You don't, you've never met Chris before. You have no ... He has never heard of your nonprofit before.
Why would you expect him to do something for you just because you have the nonprofit- Right ... in your name?" Now, if Chris is on your board, and Chris loves your organization, and he's been to 17 of your events, and he's, he's done all these things, then yeah, Chris is engaged with your organization and he's perfectly great to ask him for- Well, I would
Chris: be a pushover at that point
Mary: too
for, for, for some kind of, of thing. I said, but, um, I think the expectation, it's, it's a little entitled to go, in my opinion, to go in and ask for that. And, you know, sometimes the nonprofits that need it most are the ones that can't afford it. Mm-hmm. And so you run into that, and you have to make, and then the organization, the business has to make its decision of, of what it's gonna do.
But I, I, I really discourage my nonprofits from, for just expecting it. I said, "Ultimately, you need to be a good enough organization on the resources side and the mission side that you can afford the services you need to do your job." And no, we're not all going to make a, a million dollars, and we're not all going to just spend money wildly on, on
Because we're a mission-based organization, but if, if you need accounting services, you need to pay for accounting services. Right. If you need marketing services, you need to pay for marketing services. Now, on the other hand, if you're in the nonprofit, never hurts to ask, right?
Chris: Oh, yeah. And, and absolutely should, and absolutely I would never- Um
not consider it or help.
Mary: Mm-hmm.
Chris: But I,
Mary: yeah. But, uh, I said the expectation- Well said ... is, is, uh, I think the expectation is a little out of place, in my opinion. People will disagree with me on that, but.
Chris: No, but I, I, I think, I think that's wise. I think that's, um, that's a good way. I mean, in the nonprofit side, I've always been of the opinion, always ask for free first if you can.
Absolutely. You know, ask for it. Mm-hmm. It never hurts. You know, can we do this in kind? Can you do this as a donation? You know, we'll make it worth your time. We'll help you write it off as goodwill on your books. Whatever you need, we're, we're here. We're a nonprofit, so.
Mary: I've, I've got a, I was on the board of a nonprofit that had an auction.
Mm-hmm. And they always were looking for auction items. And I also have a friend that owns a liquor store. And so I would call my friend Lynn at the liquor store, and I'd say, "What you got that's not selling?" And she'd go, "Oh my gosh. Is it that time of year again?" I said, "Yes, it is." It is, it is the annual luncheon of the nonprofit.
And she'd go, "Yeah, I've got two or three things." Well, they're thrilled. The nonprofit's thrilled because they now get to sell whatever this is that, that, that... And it can't be something that's completely undesirable. I mean, my friend, my liquor store friend is not, you know, crazy that way. But she's like, "Yeah, I haven't been able to move this."
So it's kind of a win-win for both of them. But I know her, and I can go ask for that. I say, "This is an organization I support. Would you be willing to donate something?" And she's like, "I'll donate something that's not moving." So it, it, you know, that's not always the best way to do it. But it, it was just kind of fun to think about, about how that process kinda works, and it's a win-win for, for her.
Yeah. But now, if you went to her and said, "Can you give us, um, cash?" She's probably, "No, I'm, I can't be in the business of giving cash to every nonprofit that walks by," or, "I can't. I, I just have to plan better than that," or, "I can't do something different," or whatever. But this is something that she's able to do, and I know that, so I'm able to go back and ask for it.
Nice. And, uh, and it's, and it's win-win for her 'cause she gets to move some inventory out that, that she can't, that is not selling well.
Chris: And I'm sure get her logo on something somewhere- Yes ... as well.
Mary: Yes. And all
Chris: that.
Mary: It's always a benefit.
Chris: Always a benefit. So. That's great. Um, well, Mary, as we wrap up, I mean, this is We Built This Brand.
We're talking marketing and branding on the show. And I always like to ask, like, what brand or organization would you say you most admire right now? Like, when you look at either your space professionally or just your own personal life, like, what brand do you admire the most?
Mary: That's a great question. Just to stay on theme of keeping it nonprofit, Charity Water.
Mm-hmm. Have you heard of Charity Water? I feel like I have. It's, it's an international organization, and they do a really good job. First of all, you hear their name, and you immediately know what they do. What do they do? Water, as a charity. The transparency, I'm not sure if they still do this, but it used to be that if you donated, it went to a specific project.
Mm. And you could follow that project all the way through and, and know how your impact was actually helping. The other thing they do is they have actually a separate organization that- raises money for their infrastructure. So 100% of what they raise goes directly to funding water availability. And that split is, is a real interesting model that a few more nonprofits are starting to do because they like being able to say 100% of what we, of what you're giving us goes directly to the mission, 'cause of all the, uh, things in the news about nonprofits that are not that way.
And so that, that's one that I've, that I've really, uh, been impressed with. Another big international one that's kind of in the same similar space is, is I think it's called Heifer International. And Heifer because of cows, and I think they used to give cows to poor families in, in third world countries, and just the gift of that cow provided nutrition, and then they could have calves and, and move on and, and, um, and I think they do a lot with goats now.
I, I'm just learning about them internationally. I, I love to look at the big international ones to see what they're doing and then try to i- incorporate that back in on a much smaller scale to what's happening locally. But those would be two that I really think have kinda hit the nail on the head, 'cause you know what they're doing, and they do it very transparently, and, and the way they handle the funding is, is very amenable to most people, especially when you're talking about money going overseas
Chris: Well, I like what you said about Charity Water, because like that to me is what makes a, like any good product really worth it is like you know where your money's going.
Mm-hmm. Like at the end of the day, you can follow the money trail- Mm-hmm ... and see where it goes. And it also gives you buy-in for the future as well. If you've got something you're passionate about or something like that, like, you know, I think back to, this is so silly, but I think back to like, you know, going to Christian church concerts back in the day, and they'd be like, "Well, we're, you know, Child Voice International- Right
or one of these organizations, you know? They're great organizations, and you go and you see what they do. But you know, if you go and sponsor a child, you get a picture of the child. Right, right. And actually now that I'm saying that out loud, I'm just flashback to college, I actually photographed, actually went on a mission trip and did photos of the children at one point.
So I've actually got to meet the children that got supported- Mm-hmm ... and were doing those things, and it's just really neat to see that full circle now that I'm saying this all out loud. But it's, it is neat that like anytime you do that, you have a physical reason why you're doing it. And I think that that, that's just one of the, one of the things that's really neat about those types of organizations is you, you, you know why you're there.
I think really any nonprofit that can point back to exactly what they're doing and- Mm-hmm ... anytime you're giving money, you're, you know what the impact is beyond a rubber chicken dinner- Right ... so to speak.
Mary: Oh, I use that a lot. Yes.
Chris: You know, the rubber chicken dinners where you have one person get up and talk.
Sometimes those talks can be very powerful- Mm-hmm ... and very impactful. Other times you just watch a video and you go, "Oh, neat."
Mary: Yeah.
Chris: Cool.
Mary: Great. When's dessert?
Chris: Yeah, exactly.
Mary: So yeah, I've joked with some of my friend, uh, some of my clients that, who are also friends, that Knoxville doesn't need another rubber chicken dinner.
And I'm not sure we need another 5K or another golf tournament, but, but- ... I, I said, you know, look, if you're gonna do an event, do an event that is on mission to whatever extent that can be, and make it unique. Mm-hmm. And try to make it so attractive and so amazing that people wanna come to it even if they didn't know what it supported.
And that's, I call that a super event. Yeah. And trying to make an event that's gonna become a super event will make it sustainable. And, and there are a few of those in town. There are a few super events in town that, that really do well, and they don't even have to be the high dollar events, they're just very sought after and well run events.
And they're consistent, and they raise a lot of money, and they, and they do a lot of good. And I said, "Just shoot for that." I had a nonprofit one time that was like, "Oh, we're gonna do this big dinner." I'm like, "You're in the hunger space." Do you really want to bring your donors in and feed them a seven-course meal when you're in the hunger space?
I said, "Let's think about those optics for a second." Yeah. What, what, how is that gonna look? Maybe we need to do a dance instead. Um-
Chris: That's a good point. Yeah.
Mary: So, uh, uh, looking at the optics of what you're doing, and looking at, uh, and trying to keep it on mission to an extent. I'm not saying everybody needs to go, you know, go fast for the evening.
That, that's not the point. Right. But, um, if you're serving a, a certain population that is... I, I had a organization that was, uh, working with adults with developmental disabil- disabilities, intellectual and developmental disabilities. I'm like, what if we had a dinner in the place where you serve these people, and to the, to their availability, a- and they're a- available to do this, that they could help serve.
Mm. So now you're seeing... They could, they could take tickets. They could serve, pass the food. They could do... Um, not to exploit these individuals in any way. And I said, "We gotta check that." Right. "We gotta make sure we're not doing anything like that." But is this a way that, that, so that the people that come can actually see the individuals that are being helped?
Mm-hmm. And in this particular case, it was a work-related thing. I said, "You pay them. You pay them to come and do this, so they're getting compensated for coming and doing it." And I said, "That to me, would be just a wonderful experience," because I've met some of these individuals, and they're great people.
So what if we brought, um, our donors in to see them? And, and not just to see them, but to see the workspace, and to see what they're doing, and now it's very on-mission. And then we're gonna do something really fun and cool so that it becomes a super event, and everybody wants to come and do it.
Chris: Those are wise observations of the space.
It's just such a, um, challenge. I could, I could tell you more, but that's a conversation for another time. But Mary, thank you so much for coming in today. Well, thank
Mary: you for having me.
Chris: It has been awesome talking
Mary: to you. I, I, I, I am not at a loss for words, so I appreciate you, you, uh, accommodating me today, so.
Chris: Well, I was, so ... No, but in... I'm just kidding. But again, thank you so much. Where can people find you? Where can people connect with Leafspring?
Mary: Leafspringconsulting.com.
Chris: Awesome. Well, we're, we're looking forward to it, and-
Mary: Thank you ...
Chris: thank you for being on the podcast.
Mary: Thank you for having me.
Chris: Absolutely. Thanks for checking out this episode of We Built This Brand.
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