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Marianne Combs

Minnesota nonprofits win big on Give to the Max Day

Dance rehearsal
Ragamala Dance Company was one of 5,700 groups participating in this year's Give to the Max Day. Here, dancers prepared for an opening night performance in 2013.
Nikki Tundel | MPR News 2013

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Updated: 1:30 p.m. | Posted: 12:20.m.

Minnesota schools and nonprofits raised more than $18 million Thursday on Give to the Max Day, coming just short of last year's record fundraising mark.

Give to the Max Day is a 24-hour event urging Minnesotans to donate through a central website.

Run by the group GiveMN, the seventh annual Give to the Max Day experienced few technical glitches compared to past years. The site never crashed, and most people reported quick and efficient transactions. GiveMN reported more than 62,000 donors made gifts to nearly 5,700 groups, including MPR.

"We had more donors and more nonprofits participate yesterday than we ever have before, and that's a heck of a way to end your second week on the job," said Jake Blumberg, GiveMN's new executive director.

Like any fundraising tool, the day does better for some groups than others. Some organizations reported that the totals shown on GiveMN.org were far larger than the donations they actually received. And while GiveMN said more people gave this year than ever before, some potential donors said they opted out of Give to the Max Day this year due to past frustrations.

The impact of the day's activities varied widely from one organization to the next. For example, Cretin-Derham Hall, the private co-ed school, raised more than half a million dollars. This is an incredibly important fundraising event for Cretin-Derham; private donations make up about 20 percent of its budget, and of all those private donations, about 25 percent are made on Give to the Max Day.

On the other hand, Ragamala Dance Company reports that about 3 percent of its budget comes from Give to the Max Day. And while the GiveMN.org website indicated that Ragamala had made $60,000 Thursday, the dance company's general manager put the actual figure at closer to $20,000.

For some organizations, Give to the Max Day has become an important catalyst for generating matching funds.

Second Harvest Heartland reported that it made $663,000 Thursday, in large part because it was able to generate $300,000 in matching grants.

Communications coordinator Marie Pauley said the chances of her organization getting that level of matching funds any other day of the year are slim.