Join the Impact Cherub Club in June

We'll Take a First Look at Done Good and Clean Earth Rovers

As we gear up for the 1:00 PM Eastern, June 20, 2023, meeting of the Impact Cherub Club, we invite you to join us. The club is an informal gathering of friends who meet to review impact investments everyone is eligible to make and virtually anyone can afford. We share responsibility for completing basic due diligence before making investments. No one is required to invest.

There are no dues or fees to participate, and I don’t touch the money. When members invest, they do so directly for their own accounts. We benefit from new members only by the fresh perspectives they bring. Please join us!

Next Meeting—June 20, 2023, at 1:00 PM Eastern

At our next meeting on June 20, 2023, at 1:00 PM Eastern/10:00 AM Pacific, consistent with our plans for future sessions, the agenda will have three items:

• Diligence Reports

• Education Moment

• Preliminary Consideration of New Candidate Investments

I’ll review those items in reverse order.

New Company Consideration

After some preliminary screening, I’ve shared six candidate offerings with the club members to choose which we’ll review this month. Members chose the following:

DoneGood

DoneGood is an online marketplace that offers a wide range of products from over 120 brands committed to promoting social and environmental justice. The platform aims to make it easy for socially responsible consumers to find affordable, sustainable products that align with their values. DoneGood's proprietary screening process ensures that every brand featured on the platform meets strict standards for social and environmental impact, generating over $2.5M in sales and attracting over 8,000 loyal customers. Recent trend reports indicate that socially responsible consumer spending is on the rise, increasing by up to 25% annually. DoneGood is raising on StartEngine.

Clean Earth Rovers

Clean Earth Rovers aims to provide municipalities and coastal communities with comprehensive water quality information to ensure safe and enjoyable beach experiences. Harmful Algal Blooms are a recurring issue caused by the discharge of nutrient-rich chemicals into bodies of water, leading to billions in annual damage and health risks. Widespread monitoring is lacking, with outdated and expensive methods in place. Remote monitoring systems are either non-existent or costly. The company seeks to establish a network for monitoring water quality to prevent reactive responses and health risks. Clean Earth Rovers is raising money on Wefunder.

Education Moment

At our meeting, we’ll discuss best practices for doing due diligence on the founders and executives of the companies we may back. Investors often view the team as the most critical factor in making a decision to invest.

Diligence Reports

We’ll begin with the due diligence reports from the Impact Cherub Club members who volunteered to research the companies after we briefly learned a bit about them last month. After hearing the members’ reports, we’ll vote to determine whether or not to recommend investment in the companies. The decision will be made available to everyone who registers to attend, including those who don’t make it. Register here.

Here are the companies we’ll learn more about this month:

Climate Access Fund Corporation

Community Solar is a program that helps low-income households save on utility bills by subscribing to nearby solar projects. Unfortunately, many low- to moderate-income households in Maryland don't have access to these benefits. However, the Climate Access Fund (CAF) is taking charge of the Solar4Us @ Henderson Hopkins project to encourage investment into smaller, urban community solar projects that can benefit low-income communities. Investors in this project will receive regular interest payouts and a chance to contribute to a great cause. CAF is currently raising funds on Raise Green.

CoPeace, PBC.

Investing in CoPeace means supporting companies working to solve social and environmental issues, like improving infrastructure and producing clean energy. Anyone can invest. CoPeach selects companies with financial viability and positive impact. It uses a holding company model. It only invests in companies that meet its standards for impact, potential, experience, and profitability. Its team of analysts works hard to ensure that investors are contributing to companies that are striving to make a positive change in the world.

CoPeace CEO and co-founder Craig Jonas was recently a guest on the Superpowers for Good show. CoPeace is raising on Wefunder.

Update on The Super Crowd, Inc.

While we’re talking about investing for impact via crowdfunding—what I love to call impact crowdfunding—I should take a moment to update you on the progress we’re making at funding The Super Crowd, Inc., a public benefit corporation.

Over 40 people have now invested. The total raise is a modest $13,620. While I had hoped to raise much more by now, there is something I’m pleased about. We designed the offering for the smallest investors, not the biggest ones. The plan is working.

The average investment in TSCI is just $332. That compares to an industry average of about $1,000 for other regulation crowdfunding offerings—many of which set much higher minimums. We’ve seen Reg CF offerings with minimum investment requirements as high as $2,500!

If you take out our largest investor and recalculate the average, it’s just $214. As you can guess, many of our investors have put in under $100. Many are first-time crowdfunding investors.

We aim to accelerate the industry's growth by engaging millions of ordinary investors who will thoughtfully invest hundreds of dollars in projects every year. Millions of people doing a little bit each can provide vast amounts of investment capital to local businesses, social entrepreneurs and diverse founders every year.

To realize the goal, we need to build the community. One part of that is growing the number of people investing in TSCI. The capital we raise will enable us to host local events around the country. The money is essential. Still, building a community is even more critical.

You can help by investing in TSCI today. We have about 4,000 subscribers to this newsletter and podcast. We need your help to go from about 1 percent of subscribers investing to 10 percent. Every little bit helps. Please join us!