Do we, while feeling the satisfaction of purchasing a well for Ethiopian schoolchildren or a water filter for a Ugandan refugee family, notice the catch? Nonprofit organizations publishing alternative gift catalogs—including the organization I work for, Lifewater International—have been participating in a well-intentioned bait and switch. Read the small print:

“All gifts purchased through this catalog will go to Lifewater International’s work where the need is greatest.”

and

“Gifts made through this catalog represent a gift to the entire mission” (found in the gift catalog of a prominent nonprofit organization).

Nearly every alternative gift catalog contains a similar statement. To be honest, this tactic is good financial stewardship, enabling Lifewater and other nonprofits to avoid spending their limited resources tracking relatively small donations. Your purchase of a Lifewater hand pump accomplishes far more when it is pooled with other gifts to meet the most pressing needs than it would if the donation was tracked independently and rigidly assigned to purchasing that specific item.

Nonetheless, no one can blame purchasers for a bit of disappointment. Visions of schoolchildren seesawing on a newly installed hand pump can dissipate when donors find that their money does not actually purchase a hand pump but rather fills in gaps in Lifewater’s international project budget.

The weakness of alternative giving is that it does not adequately communicate the beauty of what actually happens with donations. For example, a donor’s $100 may have been the remaining funds needed to install a latrine system in a rural community in Kenya where children had been dying because sewage runoff infested the water supply. While less picturesque than the new hand pump, the latrine project has equally beautiful results that donors would certainly embrace.

This year, Lifewater hopes to close the gap between what is communicated to donors and what actually happens with their gifts. We hope to accomplish this through a new redeemable gift card program. This is how it will work:

Jane knows that her friend Joe is concerned that people in Africa are dying of water-related diseases. For Christmas, Jane orders a Lifewater gift card for Joe. Lifewater mails the redeemable gift card and a greeting card to Jane, who personalizes with a note and then gives the cards to Joe. Upon receiving the gift, Joe goes to Lifewater’s website and reads about six countries where Lifewater is working. He picks the country of special significance to him, Uganda, and spends his gift card there. Joe also signs up to receive reports on the project’s progress.

Lifewater’s new alternative gift program has many benefits:
-  Doing away with the traditional printed catalog significantly reduces Lifewater’s costs and carbon footprint, which means more money goes directly to projects. (In fiscal year 2008-2009, 88.5% of Lifewater’s donations went straight to projects.)

-  Both the purchaser and the recipient participate in selecting the gift.

-  Donation processing on Lifewater’s end is efficient, keeping costs low.

-  Important Lifewater projects receive funding and prayer from people who have special interest in them.

-  The country-specific donation designations are general enough to give Lifewater and its in-country partner organizations the leeway they need to use resources effectively.

-  Gift recipients learn about Lifewater, become familiar with Lifewater’s website, and receive reports on the project’s progress, involving them in the adventure of solving critical needs.

Lifewater is confident that additional benefits will emerge over time from this new twist to the well-established alternative-giving program that nonprofits depend on for year-end gifts. For now, we are stepping forward in confidence that this initiative helps Lifewater International steward well the resources our supporters have entrusted to us to make a difference in our world.