99% of nonprofits are fighting over 1% of the pot. That is cash. The real money sits in everything else a donor owns.

Most fundraisers ask for a check and stop there. Eric Wilke has spent 25 years in the nonprofit sector, first in the trenches at Dakota Boys and Girls Ranch, now leading the FM Area Foundation in Fargo. In this conversation he walks through non-cash giving the way donors actually experience it: the farm nobody wants, the second home in California, the appreciated stock, the IRA that gets taxed to pieces when it passes to the kids. He also makes the case that generosity is harder work than most people think, that a planned gift can outlive the donor, and that the best major gift conversations often never mention money at all. He also tells the story of a million dollar gift that turned on a book left in a milk crate. Get this right and a modest giver becomes a major one. 💡

Ask yourself:

📌 Are you only ever asking for cash?
 📌 Do you know which of a donor's assets are good to give and which are bad?
 📌 When someone offers an unusual gift, is your first instinct yes or no?
 📌 Are you listening for the gift, or waiting for your turn to pitch?
 📌 Would you keep showing up for a donor even if you knew there was no gift coming?

By the end, you'll know how to:

• Spot the non-cash assets sitting inside almost every donor's estate
• Explain why an appreciated asset gives more to the cause than the cash left after tax
• Compare good gift assets against bad ones, starting with the IRA-versus-life-insurance question
• Reframe the conversation around the donor's need to give instead of your need to have
• Listen for the story that opens the gift, the way Wilke did across a milk crate and an aunt from the 1930s
• Make the ask without apology, because people genuinely want to be asked
• Position a community foundation as a donor's charitable checkbook without overselling it

Key quote highlights:

”99% of the nonprofits are fighting over 1% of the pot because not all of them will only take cash.”

”Giving has to be about the donor's need to give and not the charity's need to have.”

⏱ Timestamps
00:00 The 1% problem, and why cash is the wrong fight
02:30 The nonprofit trenches, and what program work teaches you about the money that funds it
06:47 What people get wrong about giving, and why it is rarely transactional
12:22 Maximizing philanthropy through appreciated assets, plus the California home nobody would take
19:45 Good assets, bad assets, and why the IRA should go to charity
25:50 What a community foundation actually does, and who it says no to
31:54 The million dollar gift that started with a milk crate, and why the ask is a gift in itself

📌 Resources mentioned

• FM Area Foundation: areafoundation.org
• Dakota Boys and Girls Ranch
• Fargo Theatre (a nonprofit, in case you did not know)
• Seasons of Story by Max Kringen
• WellTold Conference, featuring keynote Clay Buck
• Edwin Markham, ”Outwitted” (the circle poem Wilke closes on)

🔔 Stay connected
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• Web: wetellwell.com
• Tellwell on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wetellwell/
• Max on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maxkringen

📣 About Tellwell: The Podcast
Tellwell: The Podcast is a weekly show hosted by Max Kringen, Chief Storyteller and founder of Tellwell Story Co. in Fargo, North Dakota. Every week Max sits down with nonprofit leaders, fundraisers, and mission-driven storytellers to talk about the work of building trust and belonging. You get real conversations, honest advice, and ideas you can put to work on Monday morning. If you raise money or lead a mission-driven organization, this is a table worth pulling up a chair to.

#nonprofitfundraising #plannedgiving #majorgifts #communityfoundation #nonprofitleadership #philanthropy #donorrelationships