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· Public charity

Consumer Federation of America

The Consumer Federation of America (CFA) is an association of non-profit consumer organizations that was established in 1968 to advance the consumer interest through research, advocacy, and education.

$48k
Granted FY2025still arriving
2
Grants FY2025still arriving
2
States reached
$38k
Largest
01What you fund
01100% classified

What you funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY20172025.

Public Safety & Disaster$450kCivil Rights$152kPublic Benefit$105kCrime & Legal$40kCommunity Improvement$20kMembership Benefit$7k
02FY2025 · 2 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

$38,000
Median grant
2
States reached
$16M
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
Alaska Public Interest Research Group$38,000
New Jersey Citizen Action Education Fund$10,000
02The need
03

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.

show:

Dollar for dollar, your grants (FY17–25) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 88% of your dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 10%Montana Organizing Project: $5k → 9%Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety Foundation: $195k → 12%Western New York Law Center Inc: $15k → 13%Texas Appleseed: $10k → 10%Essential Information: $25k → 14%Florida Consumer Action Network Foundation Inc: $15k → 12%WISPIRG Foundation Inc: $7k → 10%Center for Responsible Lending: $13k → 11%New Jersey Citizen Action Education Fund: $10k → 16%Veterans Education Success Inc: $10k → 8%Maryland Consumer Rights Coalition Inc: $20k → 19%Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety Foundation: $195k → 12%Texas Appleseed: $10k → 10%Center for Responsible Lending: $12k → 11%Maryland Consumer Rights Coalition Inc: $20k → 19%Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety Foundation: $60k → 12%Center for Economic Justice: $15k → 10%Maryland Consumer Rights Coalition Inc: $20k → 19%Center for Economic Justice: $13k → 10%Maryland Consumer Rights Coalition Inc: $20k → 19%Center for Economic Justice: $10k → 10%Maryland Consumer Rights Coalition Inc: $20k → 19%Center for Economic Justice: $10k → 10%0%20%40%50%more need →
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount

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.

Which US states your grants reach

AK
MT
WI
NY
NJ
CA
MD
NC
DC
TX
FL

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.

03Your edge
repeat funding

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.

85%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.
$659k · 6 repeat orgs$115k to everyone else

And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +102% since the first grant, against -6% for the ones you funded once.

6 repeat relationships — 0 still active in FY2025, 6 since wound down; 2 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

6
5

Total granted

$659k
$67k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+102%
-6%

Still filing today

83%
40%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 0% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $48k went to new ones.

50%100%’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’25
RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’25
Public BenefitCrime & LegalEmploymentCommunity ImprovementOther

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

  • MC
    MARYLAND CONSUMER RIGHTS COALITION INC
    5× · 2017–2021 · $100k · revenue +118%
  • Center for Responsible Lending
    2× · 2022–2023 · $25k · revenue +102%
  • TA
    Texas Appleseed
    2× · 2019–2021 · $20k · revenue +304%

Funded once

  • EI
    ESSENTIAL INFORMATION INC
    one grant, 2023 · $25k · revenue -6%
  • WN
    Western New York Law Center Incgraduated
    one grant, 2017 · $15k · revenue +85%
  • FC
    FLORIDA CONSUMER ACTION NETWORK FOUNDATION INC
    one grant, 2017 · $15k · revenue -96%

Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Your field

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.

1
Consumers Defense

Consumers' Defense is a 501c4 nonprofit organization whose mission is to increase the knowledge and understanding of issues, policies, products, and services of concern to consumers and to promote the freedom to act on that knowledge and…

2
District of Columbia Access to Justice

Work with DC courts, private bar & legal services providers to increase legal representations for low & moderate income DC residents, enhance efficiency of legal services, and reduce barriers to the judicial system.

Crime & Legal
3
Fund for Justice

Fund for Justice is a nationally connected social impact research and advocacy organization that works to achieve fundamental, systemic reform by addressing policies and practicies that prevent individuals from reaching their full…

Crime & Legal
4
Civil Liberties Defense Center

CIVIL LIBERTIES DEFENSE CENTER (CLDC) educates the general public about their rights and privileges under the US Constitution and provides free legal support to climate and social justice activists.

Civil Rights
5
Connecticut Citizen Action Group Inc

We encourage Connecticut residents to participate in government and their communities and we conduct public interest lobbying to advocate for consumer and environmental concerns.

6
Fair Work Center

We are workers, united across different industries to improve our working conditions and our lives. We come together as working people to build power through education, organizing, and enforcement. We work to raise and uphold standards in…

Employment
7
Worker Justice Center of New York Inc

Worker Justice Center of New York, Inc. (WJCNY) pusues juistice for those denied hian rights, with a focus on agricultural and other low-wage workers, through legal representation, community empowerment and advocacy for institutional…

Crime & Legal
8
Housing Rights Initiative

To help tenants stand up for their legal rights.

Housing & Shelter
9
Equal Justice Center

The Equal Justice Center is a non-profit law firm and employment justice organization which empowers low-income families, workers, and communities to achieve fair treatment in the workplace, in the justice system, and in our shared society…

Civil Rights
10
Center for Environmental Law & Policy

The Center for Environmental Law & Policy is a statewide organization whose mission is to protect, preserve and restore Washington's waters through education, advocacy, policy reform, and public interest litigation.

Environment
11
The Center for Election Innovation & Research

CEIR seeks to restore trust in the American election system and promote election procedures that encourage participation while ensuring election integrity and security.

Civil Rights
12
Legal Aid Justice Center

The legal aid justice center partners with communities and clients to achieve justice by dismantling systems that create and perpetuate poverty.

Crime & Legal

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is New Jersey Citizen Action Education Fund Inc and the most unlike its peers is Florida Consumer Action Network Foundation Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.

04the grantee network

11 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 20172025, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 11 of the 13 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.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
5
Early backer (in before they grew)
9/11
Grantees still filing
5/11
Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

CONSUMERS FOR AUTO RELIABILITY AND SAFETY FOUNDATION — $450,000 · OtherCONSUMERS FOR AUTO RELIABILITY AND SAFETY FOUNDATIONESSENTIAL INFORMATION INC — $24,814 · Other+3 more — $27,000 · Other+3 moreMARYLAND CONSUMER RIGHTS COALITION INC — $100,000 · Public BenefitMARYLAND CONSUMER RIGHTS…Alaska Public Interest Research Group — $38,000 · Public BenefitAlaska Public Interest R…VETERANS EDUCATION SUCCESS INC — $17,000 · Public BenefitVETERANS EDUCATION SUCCE…NEW JERSEY CITIZEN ACTION EDUCATION FUND INC — $10,000 · Public BenefitNEW JERSEY CITIZEN ACTIO…CENTER FOR ECONOMIC JUSTICE — $47,500 · EmploymentCenter for Responsible Lending — $24,700 · Crime & LegalWestern New York Law Center Inc — $15,000 · Crime & LegalTexas Appleseed — $20,000 · Community Improvement
Other$501,814Public Benefit$165,000Employment$47,500Crime & Legal$39,700Community Improvement$20,000

Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10Mgrantee revenue →↑ your share of their budgetMARYLAND CONSUMER RIGHTS COALITION INC — $100,000 over 5y, 4.0% of budgetAlaska Public Interest Research Group — $38,000 over 1y, 2.1% of budgetESSENTIAL INFORMATION INC — $24,814 over 1y, 2.6% of budgetCenter for Responsible Lending — $24,700 over 2y, 0.3% of budgetTexas Appleseed — $20,000 over 2y, 0.4% of budgetVETERANS EDUCATION SUCCESS INC — $17,000 over 2y, 0.5% of budgetWestern New York Law Center Inc — $15,000 over 1y, 0.6% of budgetFLORIDA CONSUMER ACTION NETWORK FOUNDATION INC — $15,000 over 1y, 6.9% of budget
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.

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.

Americans for Financial Reform Education FundDC15.7× affinity5 shared granteesties to 4 of 4Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund · Center for Responsible Lending · Amalgamated Charitable Foundation Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Amazonsmile Foundation

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 Consumer Federation of America 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.

2024
202122232425
no gov · 00%0%1%3%5%your share of their income ↑0%3%5%8%10%share of the org’s income from governmentmedian 9%
  • New Jersey Citizen Action Education Fund Inc9% of income from government
no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
0get no government money at all
4report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
0rely on government for over half their income
⤢ axis zoomed · 0–10%
typical government reliance, FY2025

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.

On method. Every financial figure here is read directly from IRS e-file XML — your own 990/990-PF and the multi-year returns of the 13 grantees we resolved across every year we hold, several hundred filings in all (a different count from the grant rows on the cover, which are one fiscal year)— each linked to its source. Grantee achievements and outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III); we read these as association with sustained funding — the foundation is one of several forces — suppress low-confidence name matches rather than guess, and say so where a figure rests on a single grant or filing. Not everything on this page is a filed figure, and the difference matters. Filed is what you reported on your return. Official is another government record about an organization, such as a federal award or a charity register, joined by name where no shared identifier exists. Resolved is an identity we worked out where the filing named a recipient without an EIN, kept only above a measured confidence threshold. Computed is arithmetic over those, like themes, portfolio clusters and co-funder strength. Context is a statistic about a place rather than about an organization, which is what the need overlay is: it describes the area a grantee’s address sits in, not where its work lands. Inferred is drawn by a model from text, like the partnerships read out of public news and organization websites. Each is labeled where it appears. How we build these →

Generated from your IRS Form 990 e-file return for fiscal year 2025, released 2025. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

Source object · view filing

More from the funding graph