To encourage young people to engage in philanthropy, the Chicago startup founder behind Rent Like A Champion has launched his next venture.
1Million1s, launched by Mike Doyle earlier this year, is a subscription-based, online giving platform. Each month, 1Million1s finds and vets a different organization to support and collects donations from its members, 100 percent of which go to the chosen nonprofit. Members can sign up for monthly donations of as little as $1, Doyle said.
“It’s very approachable. We want to make this something that anyone can participate in,” he said.
Doyle is the CEO of Rent Like A Champion, a service that allows college football fans to rent homes near campus during game weekends in college towns around the country. In 2015, the startup appeared on Shark Tank, landing investments from Chris Sacca and Mark Cuban.
Doyle launched 1Million1s as a way for young people, who typically can’t afford allocating large portions of their income to charity because they’re paying off student loans or saving money to buy their first home, to still participate in some capacity.
“A lot of my peers and people my age want to be more active in giving money to good causes and donating to nonprofits,” Doyle said.
1Million1s' September nonprofit is Su Casa, a Catholic worker community in Chicago's Back of the Yards neighborhood, which offers housing to low-income families.
1Million1s has previously donated $196 to New York-based Rescuing Leftover Cuisine, $236 to Philadelphia-based Springboard Collaborative and $281 to the Detroit Food Academy.
“We really want to have a wide range of organizations that we’re supporting and the idea is that this can be a discovery engine of good causes,” Doyle said.
Next month, 1Million1s will donate to Chicago-based GirlForward, a nonprofit dedicated to empowering refugee girls aged 12 to 21 from over 30 different countries, who have resettled in areas around Chicago, and Austin, Texas.
“The ultimate goal is to be having $1 million per month pass through the site,” Doyle said. “The idea behind the name is that you can get to $1 million by having 1 million people just pitch in $1 each.”
