· Private foundation
The Big John Steak and Onion Foundation
Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.
What you funded, over time
By grantee IRS cause code (NTEE).
A cause breakdown isn’t shown here: 63% of THE BIG JOHN STEAK AND ONION FOUNDATION’s grantee dollars fall outside its nine largest cause areas, whether because the recipient carries no IRS cause code or because its cause sits in the long tail. A chart would be mostly one residual band and misrepresent the portfolio.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k3 grants · $9k
- $10k–50k14 grants · $359k
- $50k–250k1 grant · $201k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| TUSCOLA COUNTY COMMUNITY FOUNDATION | $201,000 |
| ST MARY CHURCH | $41,000 |
| UNITED WAY OF GENESEE COUNTY | $40,000 |
| BIG BROTHERS BIG SISTERS | $36,000 |
| FLINT PUBLIC LIBRARY | $35,000 |
| HABITAT FOR HUMANITY SAGINAW | $30,000 |
| UNITED WAY OF SAGINAW COUNTY | $30,000 |
| CATHOLIC CHARITIES | $25,000 |
| BOYS GIRLS CLUB OF FLIN | $25,000 |
| WHALEY'S CHILDREN CENTER | $25,000 |
| TOYS FOR HOSPITALIZED CHILDREN | $25,000 |
| NRITYANJALI | $15,000 |
| TUSCOLA IMAGINATION LIBRARY | $12,000 |
| CRIME STOPPERS OF FLINT GENESEE | $10,000 |
| BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA | $10,000 |
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 (FY25–25, $25k) land where the poverty rate runs at 16%, against an area that typically sits at 17%. 0% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Your grants skew toward lower-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.
26 repeat relationships — 13 still active in FY2025, 13 since wound down; 4 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).
How the two cohorts compare
Organizations
Total granted
Still filing today
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2025, 80% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $75k 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
- FBFood Bank of Eastern Michigan3× · 2017–2019 · $52k · revenue +43%
- TATHE ARC SHIAWASSEE COUNTY INC9× · 2017–2025 · $45k · revenue +20%
- MMMYMICHIGAN MEDICAL CENTER SAGINAW3× · 2017–2019 · $30k · revenue +24%
Funded once
- MCMott Community Collegeone grant, 2018 · $40k
- TFTHE FOUNDATION FOR MCCone grant, 2017 · $35k
- SMSAINT MARY CATHOLIC CHURCHone grant, 2017 · $15k
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.
Mid michigan community action guides local residents on the path to self-sufficiency through empowerment, education and community enrichment.
The corporation is organized and shall be operated exclusively for charitable, educational and scientific purposes by conducting or supporting activites exclusively for the benefit of, to perform the functions of, or to carry out the…
To promote conditions favorable to job creation and business success in michigan.
Providing patient support, community connections, education and advocacy.
To be a catalyst for economic and community progress within the great lakes bay region.
To promote the common economic interests of all the commercial enterprises in the Genesee County, Michigan community. The Organization strives to enhance the business climate in the area and advocates for public policy that supports…
Cooperatively empowering credit unions to increase financial well-being by supporting community enrichment, financial education, and credit union development initiatives
The organization's mission is to promote a healthy business climate for its members and all businesses in macomb county, michigan.
The mission of the michigan science center is to inspire curious minds of all ages to discover, explore and appreciate science, technology, engineering and math in a creative, dynamic learning environment.
Channels individual, member, and corporate gifts for benefit of community.
Assisting the community mental health boards of michigan in developing methods for mental health planning, care and treatment.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Mymichigan Medical Center Saginaw and the most unlike its peers is Michigan Arts Access. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
14 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. 14 of the 40 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 Tuscola County Community Foundation ↗
- Who funds UNITED WAY OF GENESEE COUNTY ↗
- Who funds UNITED WAY OF SAGINAW COUNTY ↗
- Who funds Food Bank of Eastern Michigan ↗
- Who funds THE ARC SHIAWASSEE COUNTY INC ↗
- Who funds MYMICHIGAN MEDICAL CENTER SAGINAW ↗
- Who funds Whaley Children's Center Inc ↗
- Who funds Flint Institute of Arts ↗
- Who funds MYMICHIGAN MEDICAL CENTER SAGINAW FOUNDA ↗
- Who funds FOUNDATION FOR MOTT COMMUNITY COLLEGE ↗
- Who funds BACK TO THE BRICKS INC ↗
- Who funds GIRL SCOUTS HEART OF MICHIGAN ↗
- Who funds THE FRANKENMUTH COMMUNITY FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds MICHIGAN ARTS ACCESS ↗
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: Consumers Energy Foundation · Anna Paulina Foundation · Stella & Frederick Loeb Charitable Trust · Wallace & Irene Bronner Family Charitable Foundation · Charles Stewart Mott Foundation · The Whiting Foundation · Tummala Charitable Foundation · The Hagerman Foundation · Saginaw Community Foundation · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc
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 The Big John Steak and Onion 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.