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Corporate Social Responsibility
News
3.24.2008 - 03:00pm ET
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Mission Research, Maker of SalesWorks CRM & GiftWorks Fundraising Software Raises $2 Million Series B Venture Investment to Help Home Office, Small Office, Boomer Markets With Customer Management and Marketing Needs
Mission-Aligned Fund TBL Capital Invests Only in Socially Responsible Companies
(CSRwire) LANCASTER, PA - March 24, 2008 - TBL Capital has invested $2 million in
Mission Research, Inc, of Lancaster, PA, to fund the software company's
expansion into the Small Office/Home Office (SOHO) retail software market
with SalesWorks, and continue its industry-leading growth in the nonprofit
sector with GiftWorks Fundraising Software. GiftWorks is the fastest
growing fundraising software for nonprofits, and is known for its
affordability and unique, elegant user interface, donor segmenting, easy
mail merge, and inherent social networking capability. Mission Research
serves most nonprofits with software for $399 while companies like
Blackbaud (NASDAQ: BLKB) target large enterprises for an average cost of
$40,000.
"We're thrilled TBL has invested in our success," said Charlie Crystle,
Co-founder & CEO of Mission Research. "TBL shares our values of social
responsibility, and shares our goal of enabling small nonprofits and
businesses to do more through feature-relevant, easier to use web-enabled
desktop software. While other software companies serving nonprofits are
selling off, stagnating, or losing money, we are growing at unprecedented
rates. TBL is helping to smooth that path as we continue to democratize
fundraising software for nonprofits."
SalesWorks Standard 2.0 launches in late April into the online retail
channel, and will be priced at $99. "Business people have suffered with
difficult, bloated contact management for too long, and the online apps
just don't perform nearly as well as the desktop. So we take a simpler
approach to user interface design, presenting only features that are
relevant to each customer, rather than showing everything all at the same
time, which makes it easy for people to understand and use the software,
which is really quite powerful, despite its easy appearance."
SalesWorks also brings together the power of the desktop with the utility
of the web in the company's Hybrid Web(TM) platform, which ships as part
GiftWorks and SalesWorks. "It just makes sense to keep the data safe and
secure in the desktop application, but to enable customers to send mass
email, or map a list of customers, or show each contact's Facebook profile
if they have one. In fact, our built-in social networking in GiftWorks
integrates well with the Facebook platform in prototype tests, making
GiftWorks the first fundraising software to integrate seamlessly with
online social networking tools."
TBL (Triple Bottom Line) Capital invests in socially responsible companies
that have social impact as well as profitability. "We invest in companies
that have significant social impact, and Mission Research is having
tremendous impact in the nonprofit sector, enabling thousands of small
nonprofits to focus more of their resources on their missions and less on
technology,” said Joe Marshall, Principal at TBL. "We're particularly
inspired by the company's commitment to its local community. The
co-founders combined donation of 20% of founding stock to a foundation,
combined with their mission to enable nonprofits to build their capacity
to do good, is a model we want to see succeed. So far, they're doing a
great job, and we expect that to accelerate with this investment." TBL is
led by Mark Finser, Board Chair of RSF Social Finance.
The company has grown in revenue and size by almost double in the past
year, and is expected to double again through the investment. "We could
have moved to the West Coast," said Crystle. "But this is home, and we're
happy to be a part of Lancaster's community and have impact here. It's
refreshing not to have to move merely to raise money."
About Mission Research
Mission Research is a socially responsible software company focused on
serving the nonprofit and small business sectors with contact, customer,
and donor management software that's affordably priced and easy to learn
and use. Started in 2002, the company launched GiftWorks fundraising
software in 2004 and SalesWorks in 2007. The Pennsylvania company was
founded by former US Senate candidate Charlie Crystle, David Weaver, and
Chris Walker, the original team behind Chili!Soft, sold to Cobalt Networks
in 2000; ChiliSoft is now owned by Sun Microsystems [NASDAQ:JAVA]. Mission
Research company is partners with Avery Dennison, Intuit [NASDAQ:INTU],
and over 400 independent consultants. Mission Research can be reached at
www.missionresearch.com,
1-717-431-0200, or info@missionresearch.com
About TBL Capital (http://www.tblcapital.com)
TBL Capital has developed an intentional, patient capital venture fund
platform that focuses on the needs of the entrepreneur with a balanced
emphasis on people, planet and profits. With $50 million under
management, the firm invests in entrepreneurs who are committed to
building companies with strong triple bottom line returns. We provide
growth capital to help companies succeed and support entrepreneurs as they
manage the many opportunities and demands of a growing business. Launched
in the fall of 2007, TBL Capital focuses on a targeted range of socially
beneficial sectors: consumer products, service providers, software, clean
technology, green building, health and wellness, and retail.
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