110. ‘100 Women Who Care’ and Combining Charitable Gifts to Make a Meaningful Impact (with Chapter Founder Jessica Farnsworth)

In this inspiring replay episode, I revisit one of the most impactful conversations I've had on the show — a deep dive into the giving-circle movement with '100 Women Who Care.' I personally joined my own local Utah Valley chapter after recording this episode over two years ago, and I've been attending quarterly meetings ever since. Today, I wanted to bring back this episode to highlight why this powerful model of collective giving continues to grow — and why you might want to be part of it too.

Jessica Farnsworth, a longtime leader with the Utah Valley chapter, shares the origin story of '100 Women Who Care', how these giving circles work, and the incredible impact that happens when women combine their resources to lift local nonprofits. You'll hear how chapters across the country are changing lives through “Impact Awards,” learn what actually happens inside a one-hour meeting, and discover the inspiring personal stories behind the organizations they support.

And since this conversation was first recorded, the Utah Valley chapter has surpassed 100 members — growing their impact even more. Whether you’re local to Utah or living anywhere else in the U.S., there’s likely a chapter near you.

Links mentioned in the episode:

100 Women Who Care Utah Valley Website

100 Women Who Care Utah Valley Instagram

100 Women Who Care Utah Valley Facebook

100 Who Care Alliance Website

KSL Article on 100 Women Who Care Utah Valley Reaching 100 Members

Follow the podcast on social media:

Do Something More Instagram

Do Something More Facebook

Do Something More YouTube

Transcript

elissa: Just over two years ago, I featured the organization 100 Women who Care on my podcast. And I was so sold by the idea of what they do, I immediately joined. And I've been attending the quarterly meetings for my local chapter ever since.

It's a great organization. Members meet quarterly to choose nonprofits in their local community to give their combined donations to.

So it takes crowdfunding to a whole new, exciting level.

I've learned so much since I've been a member. I've felt inspired. It's been a great way to give back to nonprofits in my own community.

So I wanted to feature this episode again to encourage anyone who might be interested in joining an organization like this. They have chapters all over the United States and to just learn more and hear about the good that they are doing.

So here it is, A Hundred Women who Care.

Welcome to the Do Something More podcast,

the show all about service, where we highlight the helpers who inspire us all to do something more.

If you're passionate about nonprofits or looking for simple ways to volunteer and give back to the causes that matter to you,

this is the podcast for you.

I'm your host, Melissa Draper.

Stick around and I'll show you all the many ways anyone can truly make a difference in our world today.

Welcome to another episode of the podcast.

And today we are going to learn about a great organization called 100 Women who Care.

And I first learned about this organization actually several years ago.

I read an article about them in my local newspaper and was just super impressed by this idea of bringing women together to help donate and fund different nonprofit organizations.

And so I'm excited to have us learn more about it today with the guest that I've invited to join us today.

She works with the Utah Valley chapter of 100 Women who Care,

and her name is Jessica Farnsworth. Jessica, welcome to the podcast.

Jessica: Great. Well, thank you so much, Melissa. Thanks for having me here today. My name is Jessica Farnsworth. I've lived in Utah Valley over 30 years. I am a native Oregonian, was born and raised in Oregon.

Professionally, I have spent more than two decades in the human capital and leadership development and business transformation industries, and I've been involved with 100 Women who Care for the past eight years.

I have five kids. I live in Utah Valley in Spanish Fork,

married 22 years,

and just really excited to be here today.

Melissa: Well, thank you so much. We're excited to have you here, Jessica.

And I would love you to just start off with kind of giving us an introduction of 100 Women who Care Just the basic premise behind it, its mission and all of those types of things.

Jessica: Sure, I'd love to. So as far as the premise, it's really about creating awareness,

educating and providing service opportunities and financial impact for local charities and nonprofits.

Our goal is to keep it local and make an impact that we can see in our communities.

We do this, you know, in terms of 100 women who care chapters by growing these local chapters or giving circles to 100 members or more, with each member committing to donating a hundred dollars to a selected local charity once every three months.

100 women who care is actually part of a larger organization called the 100 Alliance.

There are over 700 of these chapters like ours that are across the country and throughout the world at this point.

There's 100 women who care, men, people,

businesses, kids.

And it's. It's really exciting to be a part of that here in Utah. I started with the chapter work that was started up in Salt Lake City about eight or nine years ago now and would drive up for our quarterly meetings and, and then just thought about four years into that that,

you know, our valley was growing so quickly. Our needs in our communities were also right there with it and thought this would be a great way to rally the forces and start to make an impact like that down here.

Melissa: That's great.

Jessica: Yeah. And I can also share kind of the origins of 100 women too. It's kind of.

Melissa: Oh yeah. Of the original organization as a whole. Yeah, let's hear that. I'd love to hear.

Jessica: And I don't. I think it was almost started by a random act of kindness and then became more formal.

So there was a wonderful woman named Karen Dunnigan out of Jackson, Michigan.

And in 2006, I think she was always actively involved in her community and giving.

There was a need in Jackson at that time for, for cribs for newborn babies. There was actually an injury and mortality rate that was going up because newborns and these infants coming home from the hospital didn't have cribs.

So she decided to do something about it. She said, I know there are enough people in my community that if I joined together on a one night event and we each gave a hundred dollars, we could start to solve this problem.

Well, that night she raised more than $10,000. They were able to buy of cribs to outfit the community with and they made an impact in that problem. And that's kind of the origins of the story.

And from there the first chapter was born.

Melissa: That's a neat story. I love Just the idea of seeing a need within our community,

but also the idea of bringing people together to help you solve a problem that seems too big for one person, but you can solve all together. So that's great.

That's a great story.

Jessica: Yeah.

Melissa: Well, you shared a little about those meetings, so I would just love. Do you mind going into depth a little more? What does a meeting look like when you get together at those quarterly meetings and what are some of the things you're doing?

Jessica: Yeah, absolutely. So the intent of the quarterly meetings is we keep those to one hour where we're actually in the meeting.

We're all busy. We all want to make an impact, we all want to learn. We all where we can direct our resources.

And so we try to keep them very much within the swim lanes of that 60 Minutes.

Our chapter here in Utah Valley, we meet the first Wednesday of every February, May, August and November from 12:00pm to 1:00pm and at those meetings, members, non members come,

anybody is welcome.

We hear from our past winners.

It's specifically the winner from the meeting before the charity will come and present and report out on how they are doing with the Impact Award, where they're directing it, the impact that they're making.

They might even have one of their clients or members of the community that they serve share their story.

It's very inspiring. You walk away from these meetings feeling great.

We also hear from three local charities. The requirement is that they be local and serving the needs of Utah Valley community members that they are designated 501C3 status in terms of being nonprofit.

Each one of those charities gets six minutes. I know that sounds like a really short amount of time to present the mission of their charity and how they would use an Impact Award to create change and drive a difference in their mission.

Melissa: I love that name of an Impact Award. Instead of just giving money,

what you are giving truly makes a difference for not just these organizations but the people they serve.

Jessica: That's a great,

that's a great call out because in the prep materials we get over to them beforehand, you know, to really help them be clear, concise and get that message together.

We point that out and specifically ask them to come prepared with an impact statement. You know, if our charity wins the Impact Award, this is exactly how it will be used.

And we try to get them to choose a particular initiative or project that they can really be specific about as opposed to it'll go into our fund for future use.

Our members really want to know exactly where the impact is going to be made, when, who it's going to serve and what that impact is going to be. So, so it's certainly,

it certainly helps people think a little bit differently about what it is they do and how they talk about it.

Melissa: And so after those are all presented, you just everyone votes for who they feel most inspired to vote for. And then do you let them know right there at the meeting?

Jessica: Yes, yeah, we actually do. So we use like a digital survey, right? Like a QR code.

And after each of the three charities presents,

we then give about a six minute block for Q and A from the audience.

And there's always great questions. Our members come from so many walks of life unified by this common denominator of, you know, wanting to know more about the needs in our community, wanting to know more about how they can make a difference and then really asking some great questions.

And then after we ask those questions, we do, we vote.

We make sure everybody's voted who's there. We typically offer a zoom option as well. We ask that only members who have committed to donating cast the vote and members that are in attendance as well.

And then we do, we announce at the end and it's a, it's a great celebration.

Melissa: It sounds like a great meeting that I would love to go to and I'm sure many other women as well. So. Great.

Jessica: We encourage guests every time, right? We, that's one of the special things about these meetings we have. I've had my daughters come,

my mother is a member,

neighbors, sisters, friends. Other members bring their daughters.

It's really fun and not just for.

Melissa: That opportunity to donate in that way, but to gather with like minded women and to learn about these organizations that are doing all this good in the community I think would be a really fascinating part of it as well.

Jessica: It absolutely is.

A couple of other interesting points is that we have some great local sponsors as well. There's, there are organizations that have jumped in and given on top of our donations.

And I can talk about that a little bit later too.

Melissa: No, that's great. I. Go ahead. I'd love to hear more about that.

Jessica: Well, I, I know that our, one of our goals obviously is to get to 100 members. Now we started this chapter in 2018. We're coming up on years and we're right at 70 members.

But we're actually really proud of that. There's other chapters that seem to surpass that 100 number really quickly, like within the first two meeting cycles.

Chapter I was involved with in Salt Lake City, they are incredible. They're up to about 270 members.

Wow. So if you, you know, do the math on that. They're giving, you know, over $25,000 every three months to a local charity, and that.

That's a huge difference.

Melissa: Right, right.

Jessica: So we're right around 70 members,

and yet for the last four meetings, our average donation has been between 10 and $15,000.

Wow. And the reason we've been able to get to that threshold,

one of the reasons, is through the Schulze Family Foundation.

The Schultze family are the founders of Home Depot, and they have decided to.

To sponsor and support 100 women who care Impact Awards across the country. So there's some certain threshold and criteria that the charities need to meet, but after each of our meetings, within a month, we go and apply for this grant, and they will match up to $10,000 at 50% as an additional grant for that charity.

So we're really grateful for the Schultze Family foundation,

as well as Meta. Eagle Mountain has a phenomenal community outreach program.

William Marks heads that up, and I encourage all of my charities to reach out to him.

They've been great partners as well.

Melissa: Yeah, that's phenomenal.

Well, it just sounds like it's taken that idea of crowdfunding or something you might find on, like, a GoFundMe, but it's so much more personable.

I. I love the community sense, the real community sense of it, too, it seems.

Jessica: Absolutely. And. And it's also called a giving circle. Right.

But behind these great ideas, there does have to be some structure.

And we hope that we've provided that I have a great steering committee, that we're all volunteers.

We do not have a bank account or a 501c3 status of our own, because our members donate directly to these local charities. If they're writing a check, the check gets written out to the charity.

We use an online donation site that is specifically for directing donations to charitable organizations.

And so that is the easiest way that our members donate is they become a part of this application called Grapevine, and then automatically, every three months, all of our donations go into a fund, and then that gets directly directed directly to the charity.

Melissa: Really streamlined process.

Jessica: Yeah, we're getting there.

Melissa: Yeah. That's great.

Well, do you have any specific stories or experiences that you've had either yourself or you've seen other women been impacted by being involved with this, or even some of the experiences you've seen with the charities and organizations that have come through?

Jessica: Yeah, thank you for asking. I sure do.

There's a couple I'd love to share.

And before I jump in, I would also add that these charities are so amazing. You can see the winners on our website over the past four years at 100women Utah Valley.com but they start to communicate with each other because we have a lot of directors and founders that are members that have presented,

but they're also now members of the group. But they start finding those common synergies of where what they do impacts the needs of what another organization or two or three do.

So they start referring their client base or the citizens that they serve to one another.

And it's been, it's been really fun to watch. So some of that will come out in the story that I share.

The first is about an organization. They were one of our first Impact Award winners called Holding Out Help.

Holding Out Help provides those from a polygamous culture the care, support and resources to become independent and self sufficient.

And so we, we really got an education about how that works, some of the disruption and trauma that comes along from individuals that are, you know, wanting to begin an independent and self sufficient lifestyle.

And we learned the story of a young woman who had left the,

the polygamous community and essentially they start over with nothing,

including that network of family support that is so important to anyone making a big change in their lives.

And so we really learned about her journey and they ended up winning the Impact Award.

And our donations went towards and actually fully funded the trade school that she applied to to learn a trade, get a job and become self sufficient. So we were able to hear from her as part of the Impact Award report out and that just, just didn't leave a dry eye in the room.

Melissa: Wow. Yeah, I bet.

Jessica: Yeah. And then like I said,

being able to bring our daughters to see the good that can happen in the community, to see the needs that are tough, but what we can do about it, what we can do together.

One time our, our chapter got together and volunteered at Tabitha's Way, who's, who's been a two time winner. Now we just sorted sort of donations for a couple of hours and we're able to take a tour of the facility.

I know a lot of our members go on to do a lot of volunteering at the organizations they learn about.

I think it also really helps in that vein as well. How do I direct my resources? Not only my money, but my time. Who else would like to know about these resources?

Melissa: Which that's obviously a huge theme of this podcast is yes, any of our resources in the ways that fit and work for us to do good and Give back to our community.

Jessica: So you're finding the people that are making a difference, and I love that.

Melissa: Yeah. I had a couple thoughts as you shared those stories.

One is that the opportunity you're giving to see the individual impact.

I think sometimes when we're serving or sometimes we're doing general service, we don't always see that, especially if we're doing things in a group sense. But just how you share.

You all got to hear this in that first story for that individual story, her experience.

And that I'm sure, impacted all of you as well. So I love that.

Jessica: Yeah, absolutely. That's one thing we love about the report out is because you do get to hear the individual stories,

and we love that.

There's one I have to share with you, one more about an organization called A rices.

Their mission is to inspire and support Latina youth with hope, confidence, and purpose.

And one of their initiatives was around their mariachi program.

And within this program,

they are essentially teaching Latina youth how to play these instruments,

and then they go out and play in the community.

And their mariachi program is intended to strengthen personal identity and create generational and cultural connections.

And so our Impact award afforded them to be able to purchase these instruments for the youth, and they actually ordered them from Mexico.

And we got to see the journey of these instruments actually being made.

They drove down to some meeting point in Vegas to pick them up. And then when they were distributed to the youth, and then we got to hear and see the youth play.

It was so fun.

Melissa: That is great. I love that.

Yeah. And that was the other thought I had was there are so many groups doing good in unique ways,

and I don't think you always realize how many until you start to be involved in something like this, to see all the very unique ways individuals have found to help their communities.

Jessica: Absolutely. And it's fun to see these organizations grow and evolve over time as well. That's been great.

Melissa: Yeah. That's great. Yes. I've. I've gotten the question many times. Well, how do you find episodes? Are you going to run it out of ideas? I'm like, nope, I don't think so.

Jessica: Yeah. If you ever do, all you need to do is call me and I'll give you 10 more.

Melissa: I'm sure I just need to go to a couple hundred Women who Cares meetings and I'll have a whole new list of people to reach out to. So.

Jessica: Absolutely. One other kind of cool thing about the quote Impact Award is, although it's hard because you want these organizations are all so good. It's hard to choose one a lot of the time and you hate to have the other two leave, you know, empty handed.

But luckily,

because we have some really generous members as well as another corporate sponsor and more mortgage educators,

this last year has done that for us. But they each walk away with a runners up donation as well.

So it's not as much as the impact award winner, but they do have something to take away. And then many times we're able to invite them back and they come and present again until they do win.

So that's great too.

Melissa: Yeah, that's great.

And I would imagine it's a great opportunity for an organization to really narrow down what their mission and purpose is and to narrow down that specific impact they're trying to make can be a benefit.

Just doing that can be a benefit for the organization as well.

Jessica: I think so. And it really provides the clarity, I think, that people deciding where to direct their money can choose as well.

One other element to what we do that I think is important to point out is sometimes when we hear the word philanthropy, it is a little bit of a word that scares people a little bit.

Or might,

might feel exclusionary. Right. Like, well,

I, I want to give and I want to be involved, but I, I don't have a thousand dollars. I don't go to galas, you know.

Melissa: Right. Not gonna go to a 200 a plate dinner.

Jessica: Right, right. And so being able to, you know, kind of look at these potential places where you'd like to make an impact,

where you would like to give, where you can give.

You know, some,

some of our members have said, hey, this is me eating out twice a week for lunch,

giving that up. Or you know, it's something similar, making it kind of doable for them in, in a doable place and in a reasonable way. It's not for everybody and it's not for everyone's seasons in their life.

And we've had people come and come back,

so, so that's good. But it does seem to make that idea of giving and becoming a philanthropist together really, really approachable and something that most people can jump in and get started and do if they'd like.

Melissa: I love that in our world today, you truly can give a little and have it make a difference. But I love to see with this organization that you're kind of joining forces to make that kind of have that bigger impact on an organization.

Jessica: Yes,

we like to say, a lot of times, I like to say together we make an impact that we can see in our communities.

So that's kind of my mantra for us.

Melissa: Yeah, that's great. Well, do you ever reach out to organizations or do they always come and find you?

Jessica: Oh, that's a great question too.

Both.

So traditional 100 who Care chapters actually have their members nominate local charities and have their members present about them.

As we started our chapter,

we were finding that we just kind of gave it a little boost. Right. And we also have found it a really nice platform to have the founders or the executive directors present on their own behalf.

They know their story the best,

they can share, you know, where they are, how, how and historically how they've been funded, where their financial support comes from, and really talk in a meaningful way about where this, these donations would be directed.

So we've invited those people to come in and then we've started kind of mixing it up each meeting where sometimes we invite back runner ups as well. As for the, for the first time in the last couple of years, at the end of our last meeting, we did have members nominate and we drew out of the hat,

literally the three that would be presenting in our upcoming chapter meeting in November 1st.

Melissa: Oh, I love that. So kind of a combination of both things. And I love that, that women can come and share their ideas or the things that they want to donate to as well.

So yes, that's great.

Well, this has been a wonderful conversation, Jessica. I have loved Learning more about 100 women who care and the good things that they're doing. And I love hearing those specific stories.

I think the final overarching theme I saw was the connection that you're able to make. The connection between women attending these meetings, the connection between groups and organizations,

and also the connection of having that impact, I think is so powerful.

Jessica: Agreed with you 100%.

Melissa: So any other final words of encouragement or advice that you would want to give to someone that's maybe wanting to join a chapter or even just someone who wants to be more involved with donating to organizations or helping with philanthropic efforts in their own communities.

Jessica: Yeah, absolutely. I think that just the mindset of I can make a difference. I would encourage people wanting to look into learning more about the community, where to direct their own resources to,

to do your research,

try to find others who are like minded, who have similar passions.

Volunteer, you know, get a little bit of experience under your belt to see what feels right where you do want to, you know, direct your time, your resources,

your money.

There are a lot of, a lot of resources out there to find out how and where you might serve Justserve is a great one.

We have a really nice collection of charitable organizations that have presented and won posted on our website to take it slow and be very intentional so you can get the most out of your efforts as well.

So it's definitely a journey. It's not a sprint.

And so just to hang in there until you find the groove that feels right for you,

stick with it. There's a quote that I love that says no act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.

And I feel like we're able to live that every time we meet and every time we learn about the great difference these charities are having in our communities.

Melissa: Yeah, that's great. What a great quote. I love that.

And I love that you mentioned Just Serve. We have mentioned that on this show before. But I love that we can add the resource of your organization as well and the different nonprofits that you've seen and been affiliated with.

So do you want to just end finally by letting us know where people can find you?

Jessica: Absolutely,

you can find us. Our website is 100 the number 100women utah valley.com and then we also have social media presences that you can look up by our name as well on Instagram and Facebook as well as LinkedIn.

Hopefully have some of your listeners join us. And you as well.

Melissa: Yeah, I was going to say you sold me. I think I might be at that next meeting. I think this is a great organization. It's right up my alley, but I think a lot of other listeners as well.

So thank you again so much for being willing to come on the show today.

Jessica: Absolutely, Melissa, thank you.

Melissa: That concludes my interview with Jessica Farnsworth with 100 Women who Care.

And since I originally recorded this interview just over two years ago, this the Utah Valley chapter has surpassed a hundred members in our giving circle with a hundred Women who Care.

So it continues to grow and have a great impact.

And I have also featured a lot of the nonprofits and charities that have come and presented at our meetings. So it's been a great experience for me. I would love to again invite you.

If you live in Utah Valley, come join us.

Come meet me and come be part of this experience or wherever you live, you can go and look up a chapter that is near you. There are chapters of 100 Women who Care or other parts of the hundred alliance all over the United States.

And anyone can be part of this cause of learning about the non profits and charities in your community and giving back to them.

So I will leave links to all of those in the show notes so you can learn more or learn how you can get involved in this effort. And as always, I would like to please ask for any five star ratings or good reviews on Apple podcasts or Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Those help me grow the show and help others find this kind of inspiring content.

And of course this week I hope that you can find a way to do something more to help lift, inspire or make a difference.