· Private foundation
Berges Family Foundation
Its FY2024 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2024.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2024
- Under $10k2 grants · $10k
- $10k–50k10 grants · $260k
- $50k–250k30 grants · $2.9M
- $250k+15 grants · $13M
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| ST LOUIS SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA | $4,000,000 |
| ST LOUIS CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL FOUNDATION | $2,000,000 |
| Individual grant recipient | $1,000,000 |
| SAINT LOUIS ZOO | $1,000,000 |
| URBAN SPROUTS | $1,000,000 |
| FOSTER & ADOPTIVE CARE COALITION | $750,000 |
| VETS COMMUNITY PROJECT | $500,000 |
| FOREST PARK FOREVER | $500,000 |
| Individual grant recipient | $500,000 |
| MERCY HEALTH FDN ST LOUIS | $500,000 |
| SSM HEALTH FOUNDATION | $300,000 |
| THE OPPORTUNITY TRUST | $250,000 |
| THE COVERING HOUSE | $250,000 |
| TOWER GROVE PARK | $250,000 |
| ST LOUIS POLICE FOUNDATION | $250,000 |
Do your dollars go where the need is?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, then read against the area’s typical level.
Your human-services grants (FY17–24, $3.5M) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 96% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty linein the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP; grantee ZIP can differ from where services are delivered.
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are actually delivered. Need from public data — U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA — shown as context about the area, never attributed to your giving.
Who you back again
Which organizations you funded more than once, and which you funded a single time. Each grantee is matched to its own filings.
68 repeat relationships — 32 still active in FY2024, 36 since wound down; 25 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).
How the two cohorts compare
Organizations
Total granted
Median revenue growth · since first grant
Still filing today
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2024, 56% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $7.1M went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
First-time = a grantee’s first year in your filing window; renewed = funded in an earlier year too. As a portfolio matures the renewed share naturally climbs — once funded, an org stays “renewable” — so the signal is the years that buck it (a new-grantee intake wave). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as “new.” Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.
Backed again, and grew
- SLSAINT LOUIS SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA4× · 2019–2024 · $5.6M · revenue +40%
- GSGIRL SCOUTS OF EASTERN MISSOURI INC3× · 2017–2023 · $3.4M · revenue +19%
- SLSt Louis Police Foundation7× · 2017–2024 · $3.0M · revenue +61%
Funded once
- ULURBAN LEAGUE OF METROPOLITAN ST LOUISone grant, 2021 · $1.0M · revenue +24%
- MHMISSOURI HISTORICAL SOCIETYone grant, 2021 · $1.0M · revenue -3%
- JFJEWISH FEDERATIONone grant, 2020 · $500k
Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.
The map has a center of gravity: the average direction from the rest of the sector toward the organizations the foundation funds — the shape of its giving. Scoring every nonprofit along that direction surfaces the ones that look most like the portfolio. These are the closest matchesthat aren’t grantees — a resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.
Mission: st. louis empowers individuals for social and economic growth through relationships and opportunity.
To promote the possibilities of charitable giving, helping charitable citizens understand how they can effectively provide for the community they love and the causes they care deeply about.
Economic development.
Transforming lives through musical excellence. the goal of the st. louis children's choirs is to empower the youth of st. louis through a rich choral program that helps each young singer realize their full potential - as a musician and as…
Thomas jefferson school engages its students in the education necessary to live as responsible citizens of the world. through the strongest possible college-prepatory program and within a nurturing community, students develop a…
As an active partner, leader and catalyst, we will assist african americans, other minority groups and the disadvantaged attain social and economic equality and stability through direct services and advocacy.
Founded In 2018, Teach St. Louis (formerly St. Louis Teacher Residency) launched to improve teacher quality and retention in St. Louis, a city where 40% of new teachers exit the classroom in their first three years. Teach St. Louis…
Greater st. louis, inc. brings together business and civic leaders to create jobs, drive inclusive economic growth, and increase the st. louis metro area's global competitiveness. we speak with a unified voice, lead with a bold agenda, and…
The saint louis zoo association was established to support and enhance the saint louis zoo by providing facilities, funds, and advice. the association provides direct financial support to the zoo for renovations, new facilities, programs,…
The mission of st. louis voices academy of media arts is to leverage media arts and storytelling to equip students with the agency to excel academically, author their own futures, and make meaningful contributions in their communities.
To provide children with hope, understanding, and compassion so they can reach their full potential.
Foster economic growth and improved quality of life in the st. louis area by producing events, enhancing its national and international image as a premier sports region, and increasing community awareness of the value of sports.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is St Louis Crisis Nursery and the most unlike its peers is Dream Builders 4 Equity. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
Your grantees are a median of 38 years old; the field is 21. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 19% startups (under 5 years old) — 1% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 1% lost their exemption, against 14% of the field you don’t fund.
Age = years since IRS exemption (a founding proxy). “Closed” = auto-revocation for 3 years of non-filing — a floor on closure, not proof, and bigger established orgs lapse least. Association, not causation.
93 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.
Each one resolved to its own IRS returns and tracked year by year — your grant beside their revenue from every source. Association, dated; never a causal claim.
Counted here: distinct organizations you funded across 2017–2025, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 93 of the 178 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile; the rest are funded organizations whose filings we could not track year by year.
Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee
Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing
Go grantee by grantee — a decade per org, and how each moved after you funded them
A decade per grantee — revenue shaded, your grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.
- Who funds SAINT LOUIS SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA ↗
- Who funds GIRL SCOUTS OF EASTERN MISSOURI INC ↗
- Who funds St Louis Police Foundation ↗
- Who funds ST LOUIS CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BOARD OF TRUSTEES ↗
- Who funds URBAN SPROUTS CHILD DEVELOPMENT CENTER ↗
- Who funds MUNICIPAL THEATRE ASSOCIATION OF ST LOUIS ↗
- Who funds URBAN LEAGUE OF METROPOLITAN ST LOUIS ↗
- Who funds MISSOURI HISTORICAL SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds THE LAUNCHCODE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds FOSTER CARE COALITION OF GREATER ST LOUIS ↗
- Who funds CASA OF ST LOUIS ↗
- Who funds GREAT CIRCLE ↗
- Who funds THE REPERTORY THEATRE OF ST LOUIS ↗
- Who funds MARIAN MIDDLE SCHOOL ↗
- Who funds WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY ↗
- Who funds CITY ACADEMY INC ↗
- Who funds EYE THRIVE ↗
- Who funds MERCY HEALTH FOUNDATION ST LOUIS ↗
- Who funds VETERANS COMMUNITY PROJECT ↗
- Who funds Forest Park Forever Inc ↗
- Who funds HAWTHORN LEADERSHIP SCHOOL FOR GIRLS ↗
- Who funds HOPE IGNITES ST LOUIS ↗
- Who funds Ranken Technical College ↗
- Who funds INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE OF METROPOLITAN ST LOUIS ↗
The grantmakers whose grantees overlap with yours far more than size alone predicts. Each orbits closer the stronger the alignment; the arcs between them show where they also fund each other. Here it reads as a tightly interlocked camp — most of these funders back each other's grantees too.
Open a dossier: St Louis Community Foundation Inc · United Way of Greater St Louis Inc · World Wide Technology Foundation · Employees Community Fund of the Boeing Company · Commerce Bancshares Foundation · St Louis Community Foundation · Edward Jones Foundation · Brown Dana Charitable Trust · The Bellwether Foundation · Youthbridge Community Foundation · Moneta Group Charitable Foundation · Trio Foundation of St Louis
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. A research starting point: overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organization Berges Family Foundation funds. Left–right is the share of its income from government; up–down is the share from you. Bigger dots raise more. Filter to federal or a single department — and drag the year to watch it move.
Government income is each org’s traced federal awards (USASpending — grants and contracts) plus state payments (open checkbooks) as a share of its total revenue (IRS Form 990); the self-reported government-grant line (990 line 1e) is carried for cross-check: a grantee that reports government grants we could not trace to a source is left off the chart rather than shown as receiving none. An association, not a claim that your grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first — a floor, not a census; state records exist for 9 states, so a grantee outside them shows no state figure (dimmed) rather than a false zero. Federal award amounts are obligations, which can span years, so a single-year share is indicative. 990 filings lag 12–24 months.
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to Berges Family Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Berges Family Foundation through trustees and officers whose names appear on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the shortest route it can evidence.
Each link is a name appearing on two organizations’ public IRS 990 filings, matched on that name and, where the filings support it, on location. A same-state match has geographic support, which is a second matching feature rather than confirmation that the two are one person; a cross-state one is the likeliest to be two people who share a name. Every hop shows its tier, low-confidence and distant paths are held back rather than guessed, and it is worth confirming the person before you use the introduction.