A Modern Nonprofit Podcast: Treasurer Nightmares

Summary

• Today Tosha and special guest Daniel discover more about a new fintech application designed to help smaller nonprofits get more organized and stay on top of the ever-changing turnover crisis. 

About Daniel Grunstein

Daniel is the co-founder and CEO of a financial technology (fintech) company called Crowded. Crowded provides nonprofit groups with an easy way to collect, spend, and manage money online. 

The Hand Overs

Daniel states the root of all evil in the accounting/treasurer world is ‘the hand over’. Or with most nonprofit organizations, the reality is that the president, club chairperson, what have you, is handing over the reins to someone new every year. Because of this, it can be hard to keep track of documentation and processes. 

Crowded is the solution to this problem, providing different areas of help in the nonprofit realm of business. 

For example, Crowded may assist with:

• Assuring the tax exempt status 
• Maintaining critical documents 
• Flow of funds system for dues and collecting dollars for events 
• Tracking of spending 

Essentially, Crowded acts as a one stop shop for treasurers of nonprofit organizations. It provides the opportunity to keep track of all essential data for the organization as 501c3’s typically experience heavy turnover. The system can also:

• Categorize expenses 
• Prepare tax filings
• Build budgets 
• Manage dollars 

The most valuable item of all? Saving the treasurer time. 

Of course, a system like ‘Quickbooks’ is a great tool, but it does require a time commitment in order to build it out. As for a treasurer of a volunteer program, this may not be the most probable solution. 

Crowded steps in this gap to sort the information on a need basis and gives the user continuity year over year with changing hands. 

Default Solutions

Daniel launched the Crowded product in the disorganized space of college Greek life. As one may guess, because of the constant changing of hands and lack of organization, this is where Daniel first noticed the problem. 

Especially in today’s day in age, younger individuals are looking for solutions via technology. Here, he and his team found receptiveness and success. The solutions to this problem are ‘verticalized’ as Daniel calls them. Meaning, that there are answers, however they are very specific. 

With this being said, Crowded only produces tax forms for organizations less than $500,000. The 990n’s or 990EZs are the forms required for these types of nonprofits, making it an easy fill and print to pdf model. 

The default solutions Daniel and his team created stem from each organization dealing with the same pain points, problems, and perspectives, making Crowded the ideal answer to the smaller organizations’ issues. 

It may be surprising that –

• Greek life
• College Clubs
• Groups/Associations 
• Boosters/Sporting Clubs
• Summer Camps
• Faith Based Organizations 

All deal with similar issues. In one way or another, it is likely that their revenue and expenses are rather comparable from an IRS filing perspective. Revenues are typically some variation of fundraising, selling t-shirts, or dues while expenses range from supplies to food. Either way, the similarities of all entities make for an easy identification on IRS line items. 

Doing More with Less 

Tosha raises a great question for Daniel – What advice would you give to organizations who are in the position to implement new (fintech) change?

Daniel answers with two wise responses: 

1. Do more with less 
2. Focus on integrations rather than new platforms 

Outside of the necessities of starting and running a business, doing more with less is essential in the nonprofit world. It’s essentially built in the budget for 501c3s. Secondly, to Daniel’s later point, integrations can be a key way to do this. Instead of constantly adding new platforms for solutions, integrations can help cut out the middle man in many scenarios, making it easier on both the business and the consumer. 

To find out more about Daniel’s platform Crowded, check out www.bankingcrowded.com. 

As a bonus, if you’re not sure if Crowded is the app for you, know that it integrates with many well known platforms such as: 

• QuickBooks
• Shopify
• Venmo
• PayPal 

To learn more about Daniel and his co-founder Darryl, check them out on LinkedIn! 

You can also find Tosha and the Charity CFO team on Youtube or our website, thecharitycfo.com!

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