For more than 30 years, Charitable Choices has been helping charities raise more money in the federal government's charity drive, the Combined Federal Campaign (CFC).
We produce and distribute three guides to CFC charities. We also reach military personnel through our Military Insert. Our website gives charities a chance to tell potential donors what they do and why their work needs support.
No one else reaches anywhere near the number of potential CFC donors that printed materials reach: more than 696,000 in 2022. Our Distribution Summary shows how we did this. Our Distribution Overview explains why our distribution -- much of it done by hand directly to federal and military employees -- is so effective. Our Impact Report summarizes the data that show how effective being part of Charitiable Choices can be.
Here are the options we're offering in 2024.
- Our attractive, photo-filled CFC Charity Guides look like guides, being organized by the types of work charities do ("Children," "Medical Research"). People use them to learn about charities they can support through the CFC, especially now that the CFC has phased out the "catalogs" of charities it used to print and distribute to employees and military personnel. We get our guides in the hands of potential CFC donors, as our Guide Distribution Reports explains. It lists the 119 federal offices, 34 Metro stations and 51 military bases we targeted in 2022.
- In each guide, in addition to their listing, charities can add display ads or charity stories. Charities can also be part of our "Why should I support your work?" pages. Each charity gets up to 75 words to answer this question, plus their taglines, logos, small photo and CFC number. This allows charities to explain why their work is so important and needs support.
- Our Military Insert, a page of full-color display ads on the inside cover of Military Family magazine, went to 450,000 people at 220 military bases and facilities in the U.S. More than three quarters are handed to people as they enter commissaries on these bases.
- Last fall we began a new option in the DC area, with the DC CFC now accounting for nearly half of all CFC giving (vs. 29% in 2017). We did a half page, full color display ad in a section that was wrapped around the Post on Giving Tuesday, which means it was seen by every Post subscriber (143,000). It was also part of the Post's digital “print edition,” which has 185,000 daily readers.
Does being in our guides and other options make a difference?
For years we’ve tracked our guides’ impact. Last year we published a report on data for more than two dozen charities that documents the positive impact our guides can have for many charities. This report builds on an article that summarized some of the most dramatic impact data we've seen, data that involved three related CFC charities that dropped out of our guides in 2014, then came back in 2015. They went down dramatically the year they left our guides, then went up when they came back.
Measuring the Impact explains the ways we and CFC charities have documented this impact. It also discusses the many factors that can affect how much a charity receives year to year through the CFC.
The details
Here is our 2024 National Charity Contract. Here are the specs for our guides, Military Insert, Recreation News Special CFC Section and our website. Here's the form to use for your charity's page in our site. Here are the seven questions each charity answers.
If you have questions or need more information, please e-mail or call us: [email protected] or 240-683-7100.