Gratis Gives, the charitable arm of Gratis payment processing, started three years ago.
"We go into a business owner's location and identify unnecessary fees, and we turn those into savings for the merchants," said Kirk Allaire, the company's president. "Then we ask a new customer to reallocate a portion of the savings to any one of our participating nonprofits."
And there's a new nonprofit on board, Northern Nevada R.A.V.E. Family Foundation, bringing the total to 13.
CARE Chest of Sierra Nevada, a nonprofit that provides medical resources to low-income families all over the state, has been there since the beginning.
"We have been receiving these Gratis Gives checks for the last three years now," said Executive Director Anne Schiller. "And they continue to grow each year, which is fantastic. Nonprofits have to rely on donations and funding from foundations, so this is another piece to our pie that really makes a difference."
Their reach continues to expand.
"We have another office in Vegas and we provide services to rural communities in 23 locations," Schiller said. "And we plan to continue to expand to additional rural locations."
It's local businesses giving back to their communities - $93,000 to date.
"I was raised in a family that always gave back," Allaire said. "And we tried to give back previously when we opened Gratis, but we were buried in legalese and minutiae from a national nonprofit, so it just didn't go well. So when we revisited the idea, we said we're going to commit to local nonprofits only and try to make a difference in out own community, because this is our corner of this earth, this is what we're responsible for."
Some nonprofits are returning to in-person fundraising. CARE Chest's Bacon, Bourbon & Brews event is August 6 at The Village at Rancharrah.
