Funders › Michigan

Bissell Pet Foundation

Grand Rapids, MI · EIN 38-3853264. Reported 2,371 grants totalling $8,768,690 to 831 recipients across tax years 2021-2024. This foundation did not tell the IRS it funds only preselected organizations.

Does this foundation accept applications?

Yes -- on its own tax return. Form 990-PF asks every private foundation whether it makes grants only to organizations it selects itself. Of the 91,758 foundations in our data that made a grant and answered, 78% said yes -- and applying to those is wasted effort. Bissell Pet Foundation did not check that box on its most recent filing, which puts it in the minority that is at least open to being approached.

How big are its grants?

The median grant is $1,800. Half of everything it gave fell between $600 and $3,600; the smallest was $32 and the largest $1,000,000. If you are asking for materially more than the top of that range, you are asking the wrong foundation.

Every organization it funded

831 recipient names appear in its filings; the 250 largest are listed here. Recipients are grouped by name and state as they were written on the returns, so an organization entered under two different names appears twice. Years funded is the number of separate tax years in which that name received money.

312 of 831 (38%) received money in more than one year over the 4 years we hold.

Measured the way we measure every foundation -- what share of one year's grantees are funded again the next -- this one retains 25%, across 3 year-to-year transitions. The median foundation retains about 67%, so this one is less consistent than most. This measures how often it paid the same organizations again. It says nothing about whether it would consider a new one.

What the money was for

Taken verbatim from the purpose field of its filings. This is the closest thing to a statement of what this foundation cares about, in its own words.

• Detroit Dog Rescue $20,000 · 2023
  Fix the Future/Spay & Neuter
• Pasco County Board of County Commissioners Animal Services Department $15,000 · 2024
  Crisis and Disaster Response
• Redrover $10,000 · 2024
  Spay/Neuter Grants & Vouchers

What kind of organizations it funds

By the activity category the IRS assigns each recipient, for the 1,587 grants where we could match the recipient to a registered organization. The categories are the IRS's. The match, made from the name and address on the return, is ours.

Giving by year

Tax years, not calendar years, and the most recent year is usually incomplete -- filings arrive about a year late, so a low final year means late paperwork rather than a foundation winding down.

Where its money goes

15% of its giving went to organizations in Arizona. If your organization is based elsewhere, look in the recipient list for grants to your area before writing.

Foundations that fund only organizations they pick gave to this one

28 private foundations that told the IRS they contribute only to organizations they select themselves reported 50 grants totalling $670,227 to Bissell Pet Foundation. That is 51% of the 55 funders we can see giving to it. Those 28 foundations do not take unsolicited requests -- their own returns say so. The IRS classifies this organization as a grantmaking organization.

12 of them gave in more than one tax year, which is the only durability signal the filings carry.

What that does not mean. It does not mean an application here reaches that money. A grant from a closed foundation is often a designated gift or a donor-advised fund earmarked by whoever gave it, and has nothing to do with any open programme this organization runs. Neither tax return says which, so neither do we. The list below is who put money in. It is not a route to it.

The 10 largest by reported dollars, of 28.

A linked name has a page of its own. We publish one for a foundation that takes no unsolicited requests only when a real share of its giving goes to organizations that make grants themselves, and that page opens by saying it does not take requests.

Both the count and the total are floors. A foundation appears here only where its return named this organization clearly enough for us to match the name to an EIN, which we manage for about two thirds of 990-PF grant rows. There are more; we cannot name them.

Funders that support the same organizations

These funders gave to organizations this one also funded -- some private foundations, some community foundations and other grantmaking charities. Shared grantees are a sign of overlapping priorities and nothing more: they do not show that any of these funders would consider a new organization. Each page says what its filings show.

How to approach this foundation

1. Check you are its size. The median grant is $1,800. A request many times that size asks for something it has rarely or never given.
2. Check you are in its geography. Its giving is concentrated in Arizona.
3. Read the recipient list above for organizations like yours. If nothing on it resembles your work, that is a real answer, and a cheap one to get.
4. Look up the current filing before writing. The 990-PF names the foundation's officers and, where one exists, its application procedure. We link it below.

Where these numbers come from

Everything above is taken from Bissell Pet Foundation's own Form 990-PF filings, which the IRS publishes in bulk. We used 4 returns (tax years 2021-2024). Grant figures are from its returns. Matching recipients to registered organizations, their IRS classifications, the retention rate and the funders that support the same organizations are our own calculations, described in how we build this.

Address of record on the latest return: 2345 Walker Ave, Grand Rapids, MI, 49544. This is the address the foundation gave the IRS; many small foundations file through an accountant or a bank trust department, so it may not be where post to a programme officer should go.

EIN 38-3853264 · See the original filings on ProPublica · How we build this

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