Why Major Donors Matter More Than Ever

For so many social justice nonprofits, 2025 was a uniquely challenging year. Along with everything else, it reminded us all how important sustainability is and highlighted the imperative of cultivating diverse revenue streams to avoid over-dependence on any single one for volatile times like these.

Nonprofits that relied on foreign aid (particularly USAID), federal research grants, or even some corporate giving may have had resources cut back or even cut off due to the pullback from funding social justice, disadvantaged communities, and DEI.

While many courageous foundation leaders have doubled down on their giving, there are many who have hesitated or just continued with business as usual.

What we notice most is an under-utilization and under-prioritization of cultivating High-Net-Worth Individuals (HNWI), who can provide the kind of recurring, unrestricted, and even transformative gifts that aren’t influenced by passing political tides. Often this results in nonprofits remaining unaware of their own internal high-net-worth donor capacity.

For instance, we just did a wealth screening of 40 donors for an established nonprofit and discovered that they had donors in their database with approximately $10M in collective giving capacity. However, the average gift from these donors has been about $1,000. A mind-blowing discovery for our client.

Not every nonprofit is going to find millions of dollars of potential HNWI hiding in their databases. But, in times like these, we think using wealth exploration to find those hidden treasurers makes good financial sense. And we’re so confident, your first 5 names are on us in 2026.