Giving more expendable than gym membership, survey finds

Fundraising | Celina Ribeiro | 1 Jun 2010

The urge to stay fit would appear to be stronger than the impulse to give to charity, according to a year-long survey of just under 20,000 donors.

More than a third of donors to the JustGiving website reported that they were considering cutting down on the amount they gave to charity, compared to 24 per cent who had entertained the idea of reducing their spend on gym membership. Philanthropy ranked as more critical to spending habits, however, than eating out or going on holidays, both of activities JustGiving donors appeared relatively willing to cut back on (73 per cent and 54 per cent respectively).

But the results of the survey were far from pessimistic. The vast majority of donors, surveyed after making a donation to the sponsorship site between January 2009 and February this year, had planned to either maintain or increase their giving levels. Less than one in fifty donors said they plan to stop their giving altogether.

More positive news came on the donation value front, the site reports that the average donation value increased over the course of the 13 months of the survey.

Jonathan Waddingham, digital strategist at JustGiving, said that the results were “encouraging”. “Anecdotal feedback tells us that that who still had money to give felt a responsibility to make up for any shortfall charities are feeling in the downturn,” he said.

Directory: JustGiving
Who's Who: Jonathan Waddingham

Comments

[Cancel] | Reply to:

Name *

Email *

Organisation

Job Title

Comments *

Verification *

* Please read our Community Standards

Close »

Community Standards

The civilsociety.co.uk community and comments board is intended as a platform for informed and civilised debate.

We hope to encourage a broad range of views, however, there are standards that we expect commentators to uphold. We reserve the right to delete or amend any comments that do not adhere to these standards.

We welcome:

Robust but respectful debate
Strongly held opinions
Intelligent relevant discussion
The sharing of relevant experiences
New participants

We will not publish:

Rude, threatening, offensive, obscene or abusive language, or links to such material
Links to commercial organisations or spam postings. The comments board is not an advertising platform
The posting of contact details for yourself or others
Comments intended for malicious purpose or mindless abuse
Comments purporting to be from another person or organisation under false pretences
Gratuitous criticism, commentary or self-promotion
Any material which breaches copyright or privacy laws, or could be considered libellous
The use of the comments board for the pursuit or extension of personal disputes

Be aware:

Views expressed on the comments board are left at users’ discretion and are in no way views held or supported by Civil Society Media
Comments left by others may not be accurate, do not rely on them as fact
You may be misunderstood - sarcasm and humour can easily be taken out of context, try to be clear

Please:

Enjoy the opportunity to express your opinion and respect the right of others to express theirs
Confine your remarks to issues rather than personalities

Together we can keep our community a polite, respectful and intelligent platform for discussion.