What’s the difference between a Giving Circle and a Fiscal Sponsorship?

❓ What’s the difference between a Giving Circle and a Fiscal Sponsorship for community organizing?

While both giving circles and fiscal sponsorships are ways to raise and distribute charitable funds, they serve different purposes and offer different structures—especially for organizers working to build power and create change.

🔄 Fiscal Sponsorship: A platform to operate and grow your community organizing work

A fiscal sponsorship is a partnership with a 501(c)(3) nonprofit (like Pure Charity) that allows your organizing project to:

Receive tax-deductible donations
Access nonprofit tools and infrastructure
Operate legally under the sponsor’s tax-exempt status
Disburse funds for programs, stipends, events, etc.
Comply with IRS and nonprofit rules

Your project doesn’t need to become its own nonprofit. Instead, it’s treated as a charitable initiative under the legal and financial umbrella of the sponsor. This gives you credibility, transparency, and compliance—without the complexity of running a full nonprofit.

✅ Best for: Community groups doing direct organizing, mutual aid, advocacy, or local campaigns that need to raise and spend funds in a compliant, accountable way.

🤝 Giving Circle: A group of donors pooling funds to support others

A giving circle is a group of people who pool their money and make collective decisions about where to give it. Giving circles:

Don’t run programs or campaigns directly
Typically give grants to other nonprofits or fiscally sponsored projects
Are often focused on relationship-building, shared values, and community giving
May or may not operate under a fiscal sponsor depending on size or goals

Giving circles are great for collective philanthropy, but they are not set up to run organizing efforts themselves. If a giving circle wants to fund mutual aid, support local initiatives, or give to a grassroots organizer—they often give to fiscally sponsored projects like yours.

✅ Best for: Donors who want to give collaboratively, support grassroots work, and build community through shared giving decisions.

📌 Key Differences

Feature	Fiscal Sponsorship	Giving Circle
Legal structure	Operates under a 501(c)(3) sponsor	May or may not have a legal structure (Pure Charity Giving Circles do).
Main purpose	Support organizing work with legal & financial tools	Pool and grant funds to others
Who leads the work	Organizers lead and direct activity	Donors decide where to give
Fund management	Sponsor provides admin & oversight	Often informal or donor-led
Receives donations?	Yes, tax-deductible via sponsor	Sometimes, depends on setup
Spends funds on programs?	Yes	No (gives grants to others)

🧭 Which one is right for me?

If you're doing community work—organizing events, responding to crises, advocating for policy, or running a local campaign—a fiscal sponsorship gives you the structure and support to fund that work responsibly.

If you’re a donor or funder looking to support others, or you want to bring people together to give collaboratively, a giving circle is a better fit.

Related to

PURE CHARITY

Pure Charity About Pure Charity Fiscal Sponsorships