Evaluating a Product Donation Program: Challenges for Charitable Capacity

• Published date: 01 March 2014
• Author: Gordon Abner,Beth Gazley
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/nml.21094
• Date: 01 March 2014

Evaluating a Product Donation

Program

Challenges for Charitable Capacity

Beth Gazley, Gordon Abner

Indiana University-Bloomington

This article offers one of the first efforts at describing the

impact of a national product donation program. Despite

the importance of in-kind giving to the corporate and charita-

ble sectors, little research has explained how in-kind gifts are

used effectively once they leave the donor’s hands. In this study

we examine outcomes and impacts associated with a product

donation program, including numbers served, a faith-based

mission, the ability to process product donations effectively, the

extent of performance measurement, and the effect of program

experience on continued participation. Data come from

Good360’s Framing Hope program, a partnership between The

Home Depot stores and local charities across the United States.

Our findings support the organizational capacity literature in

suggesting that experience with this program only partly miti-

gates the challenges of participation and that success may be

due to how central the program is to organizational objectives.

Keywords: in-kind giving, corporate social responsibility,

performance measurement, organizational capacity, faith-

based organizations

IN-KIND GIVING COMPRISES AN increasing portion of the $15 billion

in corporate gifts donated in 2010 (Committee Encouraging

Corporate Philanthropy [CECP] 2010; Giving USA 2011).

However, little research exists that can explain how in-kind gifts

Correspondence to: Beth Gazley, Indiana University, Public & Environmental

Affairs, 1315 E. Tenth St. 410-C, Bloomington, IN 47405–1701. E-mail: bgazley@

indiana.edu.

The authors gratefully acknowledge the Lilly Family Indiana University School of

Philanthropy Research Fund, The Home Depot Foundation, and Good360 for sup-

porting this research.

NONPROFIT MANAGEMENT & LEADERSHIP, vol. 24, no. 3, Spring 2014 © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc 337

Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/nml.21094

338 GAZLEY, ABNER

Nonprofit Management & Leadership DOI: 10.1002/nml

are used effectively once they leave the donor’s hands. This article

offers the first empirical assessment of a national product donation

program framed in the performance management capacity litera-

ture. We offer both a general descriptive analysis of the experience

that participating charities had with one in-kind giving program,

and a hypothesis-driven statistical analysis of the factors that drive

program effectiveness. Titled “Framing Hope,” the program

matches The Home Depot stores across the country with local

charities that gain access to a wide variety of donated home im-

provement products and building supplies. The matching activity

occurs through Good360 (formerly Gifts In Kind International),

the nation’s leading broker and facilitator of corporate product do-

nations to charities. By itself one of the largest charitable organiza-

tions in the United States, Good360 facilitated the distribution of

more than $350 million worth of corporate donations to more than

150,000 religious, charitable, and public organizations in 2010.

Literature Review

In-kind giving describes direct or indirect noncash donations of

services or products. Corporate product donations represent a sub-

set of all in-kind giving, distinct from gifts of time and expertise

such as pro bono services. Product donations take many forms, in-

cluding food, pharmaceutical and health care products, house-

wares, computer equipment, and other retail products. In the case

of the Framing Hope program, The Home Depot home building

products are donated both directly (to recipient charities, such as a

social service agency, which use them in their own programming)

and indirectly (to charities that pass on the donations to individu-

als, such as a Habitat for Humanity building project). In contrast

to “storefront” operations like Goodwill or Habitat for Humanity

“ReStores,” the product donations in this program are not in-

tended for resale.

Although there is considerable scholarship on cash giving of all

kinds and also on corporate social responsibility, a substantial

research gap exists with respect to noncash and in-kind giving. This

gap exists despite strong corporate interest in in-kind giving, which

represents at least half of all corporate philanthropy (Giving USA

2011). The research has been more robust on establishing the busi-

ness case for corporate giving, with evidence that consumers

respond to corporate social responsibility initiatives (Bhattacharya

and Sen 2004). But little research exists that can explain how in-

kind gifts are used effectively once they leave the donor’s hands or

on how they affect recipients. A 2008 report to the U.S. Congress on

the tax impacts of in-kind giving did not address whether in-kind

giving requires additional resources for charities to effectively use

the gifts (Jackson 2008). Some scholars of corporate social respon-

sibility have noted this gap, observing the need for better sources of

Good360

facilitated the

distribution of

more than $350

million worth of

corporate

donations to more

than 150,000

religious,

charitable, and

public

organizations in

2010.