I signed up for "amazon smile" a few months ago and made the General Society of Mayflower Descendants my charity. I hadn't used it yet since the Pilgrim Hall Museum in Plymouth is my designated charity on goodsearch.com and goodshop.com and I'd been doing any amazon shopping through goodshop to earn Pilgrim Hall a few pfennigs. Goodsearch pays a penny for every unique online search I do through their browser and goodshop pays varying amounts when I buy something online. (Note: I ONLY buy things through charity browsers like goodshop and upromise when that is the least expensive source and I was going to buy that item anyway. Still, Ben's 529 college savings account got about $550, albeit over 12 or 13 years, and Pilgrim Hall gets $20-30 per year via me alone.)
My idea was to start far enough ahead of time that Pilgrim Hall Museum would have a significant contribution "from" me by 2020 (the 400th anniversary of the Pilgrim's landing at Plymouth) in order to fund their activities. It is frustratingly difficult to track what Pilgrim Hall actually gets "from" me via a goodshop amazon.com purchase because amazon's payment promise is "up to 1.5%." It's also not clear if they donate anything sold via a 3rd-party vendor, even a corporation. They take months to give the contribution to goodshop and are vague about the formula their "up to" contribution actually uses. I can't tell on goodshop's site what, if anything, a purchase there netted Pilgrim Hall. Long story, but I tried "amazon smile" today in hope that I will be able to figure out whether one method or the other nets significantly more for the charity of my choice.
I will let you know if I learn anything because online charity systems like this, prudently used, can mean a significant income for the charity of your choice. (Under full disclosure laws I should probably tell you that this site is an amazon affiliate. There is an ad on the home page and a link on the links page and if you accessed amazon through that link and bought anything, mayflowerfaces would get a tiny percentage. No one has ever done that, but still. I did not place an amazon affiliate link on this post.)
My idea was to start far enough ahead of time that Pilgrim Hall Museum would have a significant contribution "from" me by 2020 (the 400th anniversary of the Pilgrim's landing at Plymouth) in order to fund their activities. It is frustratingly difficult to track what Pilgrim Hall actually gets "from" me via a goodshop amazon.com purchase because amazon's payment promise is "up to 1.5%." It's also not clear if they donate anything sold via a 3rd-party vendor, even a corporation. They take months to give the contribution to goodshop and are vague about the formula their "up to" contribution actually uses. I can't tell on goodshop's site what, if anything, a purchase there netted Pilgrim Hall. Long story, but I tried "amazon smile" today in hope that I will be able to figure out whether one method or the other nets significantly more for the charity of my choice.
I will let you know if I learn anything because online charity systems like this, prudently used, can mean a significant income for the charity of your choice. (Under full disclosure laws I should probably tell you that this site is an amazon affiliate. There is an ad on the home page and a link on the links page and if you accessed amazon through that link and bought anything, mayflowerfaces would get a tiny percentage. No one has ever done that, but still. I did not place an amazon affiliate link on this post.)
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