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Texas · Nonprofit

THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT

THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT (Texas) receives grants from 69 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,428,106 to it, the largest being DONOR ADVISED CHARITABLE GIVING INC ($388,091). 28 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 80% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.

Revenue FY2025
$1.4M
Funders on record
69
Grants received
$1.4M
Net assets
$801k
28/69 repeat funderspeak grant-dependency 23%
01What it does

What The Birthday Party Project does

Mission

The mission of The Birthday Party Project is to bring joy to homeless children through the magic of birthdays.

As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.

Program

  1. Provide birthday gifts to birthday kids, birthday in a bag to birthday kids, and birthday parties to birthday kids and their families.

    $1,007,015 spentof which $6,557 as grants
    100% of program spending

The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $1,007,015.

02The organization over time

The organization over time

Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended.

100 = 20172017 Revenue 100 ($1.1M) Expenses 100 ($902k) Net assets 100 ($785k)2018 Revenue 90 ($997k) Expenses 117 ($1.1M) Net assets 93 ($731k)2019 Revenue 113 ($1.3M) Expenses 126 ($1.1M) Net assets 107 ($844k)2020 Revenue 128 ($1.4M) Expenses 139 ($1.3M) Net assets 130 ($1.0M)2021 Revenue 60 ($664k) Expenses 88 ($793k) Net assets 114 ($894k)2022 Revenue 108 ($1.2M) Expenses 99 ($896k) Net assets 152 ($1.2M)2023 Revenue 104 ($1.2M) Expenses 141 ($1.3M) Net assets 137 ($1.1M)2024 Revenue 89 ($987k) Expenses 145 ($1.3M) Net assets 96 ($755k)2025 Revenue 129 ($1.4M) Expenses 154 ($1.4M) Net assets 102 ($801k)
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Revenue (129)Expenses (154)Net assets (102)

Balance sheet

Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2021 to 2022, from $1.0M to $1.3M (+31%).

$848k
$844k
$941k
$1.2M
$1.0M
$1.3M
$1.3M
$1.2M
$1.2M
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Total assetsTotal liabilities

How it's funded, over time

Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.

2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
ContributionsProgram revenueInvestmentOther

Government-grant reliance: 2021 6% · 2022 6% · 2023 5%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 4 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.

$207k
’17
−$54k
’18
$113k
’19
$168k
’20
−$130k
’21
$303k
’22
−$117k
’23
−$324k
’24
$46k
’25
3.2
months of
reserve

Leadership and staff

The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.

Chief executive

Wade Lairsen

CEO

Board chair

Trae Watlington

Chairman

As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.

The chief executive listed changed between the FY2021 and FY2022, and between the FY2023 and FY2024, and between the FY2024 and FY2025 filings.

'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Listed991412121010118
Joined·+3+9+3+0+4+2+2+4
No longer listed·34506217
03Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 9 funders to 19 funders, grant income rose $92k → $115k.

19 of 69 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 80% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.

From the IRS filings of THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 69 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

How concentrated its funding is

THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 27% of grant income, and it takes 3 funders to reach half.

the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 3 funders to its left

82% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT.

27%
largest funder
56%
top three
~8
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 33% · 2018 41% · 2019 52% · 2020 28% · 2021 47% · 2022 46% · 2023 29% — diversifying over time.

“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

How long its funders stay

23% of THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 41% give in more than one year at all.

first grant+1y+2y+3y+4y+5y+6y

Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.

Where its funders are

80% of THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $292k that is directly attributable, 60% of it comes from funders outside Texas, across 17 states.

MN
IL
NY
PA
NJ
CT
CA
CO
MO
DE
AZ
NC
DC
AL
GA
TX
FL

In-state vs out-of-state, by year

’17
’18
’19
’20
’21
’22
’23
Texas out of state home

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $1.1M arriving through sponsors registered in 14 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

04Its place in the field

Organizations like THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT

Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.

In Texas

Nationally

05Profile & governance

Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.

Where the money goes

72% of spending goes to programs.

Program 72%Management 12%Fundraising 16%

Governance

7
board members
86%
independent
✓Conflict-of-interest policy✓Whistleblower policy✓Document retention✓Board reviewed the 990✓Audited financials

Public support

96%

Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.

Screen this organization

A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.

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Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf

Questions and answers

Who funds THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT?
THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT (Texas) receives grants from 69 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,428,106 to it, the largest being DONOR ADVISED CHARITABLE GIVING INC ($388,091). 28 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 80% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
How many funders does THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT have?
IRS filings report 69 organizations giving $1,428,106 in grants to THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT, 28 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT?
DONOR ADVISED CHARITABLE GIVING INC is the largest funder on record, with $388,091 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like THE BIRTHDAY PARTY PROJECT find more funders?
Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Texas. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.

Play a game about who funds Birthday Party Project →

These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 69 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing