“I call it my Little Green Engine that Could,” says Rhonda Bannard, the one-woman powerhouse behind Earth Gives, a concept centered around increasing the impact of nonprofit organizations.
EarthGives.org is Bannard’s brainchild, conceived as the result of a lifetime of wanting to make a difference by bringing together like-minded people. Before it was an expansive website or a downtown revitalization concept, Earth Gives was an ambitious idea. Its ultimate intention? Gathering individuals behind a common cause.
“My backstory frames this story,” Bannard says, regarding how Earth Gives came to be. Originally from Canada, she lived in Phoenix for years and eventually graduated from the University of Arizona with her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Radio and TV. Eventually, Bannard found herself drawn away from the world of television and instead became interested in working with Arizona nonprofit organizations with her now ex-husband.
“For the last 20 years, I’d been consulting with nonprofits predominantly,” she says. “[I realized that] nonprofits need help with fundraising. I always pay attention to a lot of things and connect the dots, and I’ve often been ahead of the curve.”
Describing it as a blessing and a curse, she recalled being voted Most Spirited when she was in high school. “I love people rallying together for a common cause, and I got to thinking. How come we only come together when a sports team’s doing something?”
Bannard became a marketing manager for the downtown Phoenix partnership and was tasked with revitalizing the downtown area. She began to conceptualize a physical location in a local and sustainable setting where people could gather together under a common cause. “The whole concept of it was a community gathering space in the core of downtown. [I thought], our downtown isn’t doing what it needs to do,” she says of what Phoenix looked like a few years ago. “Why don’t I do something about it?”
Bannard worked for about six years on this particular idea, meeting with hundreds of people in the Valley and conducting focus groups with diverse communities. She eventually fixed her eyes on a building owned by the City of Phoenix. After gaining support from the city council, it looked like her vision would come to fruition in 2018. But at the last minute, she lost the building, forcing her to go back to the drawing board with Earth Gives.
Eventually, Bannard began to consider creating a website that could serve as that community she was so desperately trying to create. “How do we bring people together? We start with nonprofits,” she says.
And EarthGives.org was born. The ultimate intention behind it was to bridge the gap between important causes and people looking to make a difference by connecting them with nonprofit organizations. Bannard considered creating a Giving Day platform that would “message in a way that provokes outcomes” in a manner that was proven to work. Now, Bannard is counting down the days until the first annual Earth Gives Day on Oct. 7, 2021. It’s set to become a yearly giving day to advance environmental nonprofits through a day of donations and financial support.
“This is rooted in my concern for our future and my kids’ future and our world,” Bannard says regarding her journey with Earth Gives. “I’m devoted to this, as long as I can be, to do one little something in the world.”
Regardless of its current form, the mission behind Earth Gives continues to live on. “The point is to utilize a proven tool as an entry point around the most pressing issue of our time,” says Bannard. “Thoughtful messaging – that’s what we’re building towards and thinking about.”
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