(Photo above: Lisa Shropshire and Talena Barker of new Bend startup Mission Limelight | Photo courtesy of Startupbend.com)
When it comes to raising funds for charity, there are few things more effective than an auction. But when auction items go for less than what their donors hoped—or don’t capture the audience’s attention at all, then everyone misses out.
“We were working on fundraising projects and having conversations behind closed doors about how we’re leaving money on the table with auction items,” says Talena Barker, a former nonprofit fundraiser and founder & CEO of Bend-based Mission Limelight.
The biggest challenge? Most charity auction donations come from local donors, which don’t inspire high bidding because they aren’t new or unique to the local audience, Barker says. Thus, packages sell for far less than value, fail to excite guests and leave auction donors less than happy.
In trying to make the most of every auction, Barker found a creative workaround. She’d call like-minded nonprofits in other places and trade auction items in hopes of garnering bigger donations for them.
“We started setting up these informal exchanges,” she recalls. “It took a lot of legwork, but the results—better auction items bringing in bigger donations—were worth it.”
Barker was certain that someone would turn this good idea into a company. Turns out, that person was her.
A marketplace for good
Barker and Lisa Shropshire, the startup’s Director of Outreach, have 30 years of nonprofit fundraising experience between them. They started Mission Limelight earlier this year and have been in a whirlwind of startup activity since.
Just a few of their milestones include: Being chosen as part of the first cohort of the XXcelerate Fund’s accelerator program; pitching Mission Limelight on the Bend Venture Conference stage as a concept stage finalist, and launching their product the same day.
So, what does Mission Limelight do?
“The best way for people to understand how the product works is HomeExchange.com,” Shropshire says. “At its first level, the startup creates an exchange-based marketplace for donated auction items—a place for nonprofits to mutually search for and trade the best items for their auctions.
“At the second level, companies who regularly donate items can note their offerings on the Mission Limelight platform. Then nonprofits can search the inventory and select things that they think their audience would love.”
Building a marketplace
The Mission Limelight win-win? Nonprofits end up with unique auction items that bring in higher donations. For companies, the platform reduces the work of fielding numerous requests for donated items, and they can target their charitable giving in a way that supports their marketing efforts – with the ability to load their offerings into the platform with any philanthropic or advertising demographic parameters and then direct fundraisers that way.
With the increasing emphasis on corporate responsibility, Barker and Trashier say the next phase of Mission Limelight is to help companies improve the tracking, understanding and reporting on their giving.
Building a marketplace comes with its own challenges. Barker notes that at the beginning you face a “chicken-egg” situation, with nonprofits wanting to join once the companies have come on board, and vice versa. That said, Mission Limelight has 18 clients and counting.
Go big and do good
For 2018, the startup is focused on getting more nonprofits into their system. They’ve raised over $50,000 from family and friends and Barker says they’re pursuing more seed funding this year to spur sales and product development.
The long-term vision is to help businesses better examine their giving and provide an easier way for them to report their successes, all the while gathering data on donations and auction sales. The latter will help businesses and non-profits make smarter, more effective gifting decisions. “That’s our change the world plan,” says Barker.
About Mission Limelight
Mission Limelight is a new, secure and easy-to-use digital platform where non-profits exchange their locally sourced auction items with other organizations nationwide and raise more money.
missionlimelight.com
