Minnesota · Private foundation
The Sauer Family Foundation
Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.
- $14M
- Granted FY2025(still arriving)
- 110
- Grants FY2025
- 125
- Organizations funded FY2024
- 27%
- First-time grantees FY2024
- Median grant, FY2025
- $90,000
- Largest grant, FY2025
- $900,000
- Organizations funded a year
- 39 to 125
- FY2018 to FY2024
- States reached, FY2025
- 6
- Total assets, FY2025
- $49M
- Applications
- Takes unsolicited applications
- Per its most recent filing; check its own site
How open it is to new grantees
In FY2024, 27% of the organizations The Sauer Family Foundation funded were first-time grantees, receiving 54% of its grant dollars.
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2024, 46% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $11M went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
How this is measured
The numbers by year
| Fiscal year | Organizations funded | To those organizations | First-time grantees |
|---|---|---|---|
| FY2025still arriving | 108 | $14M | 27% |
| FY2024 | 125 | $21M | 27% |
| FY2023 | 113 | $12M | 45% |
| FY2022 | 80 | $5.5M | 31% |
| FY2021 | 74 | $5.0M | 50% |
| FY2020 | 64 | $2.7M | 48% |
| FY2019 | 56 | $1.6M | 80% |
| FY2018 | 39 | $748k | 62% |
What it funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2025.
Where its grants go
Grant dollars by states, across the years we hold.
Which US states its grants reach
Top grantees
Largest recipients by total granted, FY2017 to FY2025, and the share of each one’s budget the grants supplied at peak.
| Grantee | Total granted | Years | Share of their budget |
|---|---|---|---|
| V3 Sports Inc | $3,000,000 | 1 | 13% |
| University of Minnesota Foundation | $1,943,491 | 8 | 0% |
| Wayside House Inc | $1,349,244 | 6 | 4% |
| Wallin Education Partners | $1,293,000 | 4 | 4% |
| Amherst H Wilder Foundation | $1,174,980 | 4 | 1% |
| Foundation for the Arts and Trauma Inc | $1,070,000 | 5 | 37% |
| Lutheran Social Service of Minnesota | $1,050,986 | 3 | 0% |
| Serveminnesota | $945,000 | 5 | 0% |
| Black Men Teach | $830,000 | 5 | 16% |
| University of St Thomas | $762,500 | 6 | 0% |
Show all 192 grantees
What it could do for these grantees
Plus 113 recipients with no EIN on record ($24M), not named here.
Where it is load-bearing
The Sauer Family Foundation supplied at least a quarter of the budget for 11 of its grantees at some point. The chart plots its 160 largest grantees; load-bearing ones sit top left.
Tap a dot to name the grantee.
How this is measured
Co-funders
Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a tightly interlocked group: most of these funders back each other's grantees too.
Open a dossier: Otto Bremer Trust · Saint Paul & Minnesota Foundation · Greater Twin Cities United Way · Medica Foundation · The Minneapolis Foundation · Fr Bigelow Foundation · The Richard M Schulze Family Foundation · The Sheltering Arms Foundation · The Walser Foundation · Pohlad Family Foundation · Mardag Foundation · Hardenbergh Foundation
How this is measured
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to The Sauer Family Foundation?
Find your warmest path to The Sauer 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.
About The Sauer Family Foundation
- How much does The Sauer Family Foundation give?
- The Sauer Family Foundation reported 110 grants totaling $13,914,886 in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 39 and 125 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2024.
- What does The Sauer Family Foundation fund?
- By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2025, its largest causes are Human Services (26%), Education (22%), Philanthropy (15%).
- Who are The Sauer Family Foundation's largest grantees?
- By total granted over FY2017 to FY2025: V3 Sports Inc ($3.0M), University of Minnesota Foundation ($1.9M), Wayside House Inc ($1.3M).
- Does The Sauer Family Foundation fund new organizations?
- In FY2024, 27% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.
- Does The Sauer Family Foundation accept unsolicited applications?
- Its most recent filing reports that it accepts unsolicited grant applications.
- Which funders back the same organizations as The Sauer Family Foundation?
- Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Otto Bremer Trust, Saint Paul & Minnesota Foundation, Greater Twin Cities United Way.
- Where is The Sauer Family Foundation based?
- The Sauer Family Foundation is based in MN.
Play a game based on Sauer Family’s filings →