The power of Five Bucks: founder Brianna Kerr on ‘going small to go big’

Five Bucks – a giving community where members chip in $5 a week – is all about how small change can have a big impact. Giving News talks with the founder of this collective giving initiative as the community distributes its first $62,000. In this Q&A, Brianna Kerr (pictured) shares fascinating insights on the democratisation of giving in action – and what’s in store for year two.

1. What is the Five Bucks community and how does it work?

It’s all in the name! Members or ‘Buckaroos’ give $5 a week to fund organisations that support people and protect the planet. We pool the fivers and grant out the entire fund once a year.

Our giving pillars are inspired by ‘Doughnut Economics’, a model developed by Kate Raworth. In its basic form, it’s the idea that a just and sustainable world must meet everyone’s social needs while also staying within the ecological limits of our planet. It reflects the kind of world our members want to help build.

2. What type of people are becoming Buckaroos?

The community is evolving as we grow. Our earliest adopters were under 30, folks who saw Five Bucks as an accessible way to ‘chip in’ to support causes they care about. But the demographics are more divergent now because there is a broad appeal to the simplicity of the idea. Anyone is welcome to become a Buckaroo.

One common theme is that our members are the type of people who care about lots of things. They’re worried about climate, but they’re also worried about mental health, the state of First Nations rights, equitable access to education. They want to show up for and engage with all of these issues and they understand their intersectionality.

3. How has year one gone and what will be your focus in Five Bucks’ second year?

It has been a lot of fun. Most of our members are finding us through word-of-mouth, so there has been a lot of nice organic referral and from that, a genuine community beginning to form. We gave $62K away in our first year (4 x $15K grants to the organisations who received the most votes and 4 x $500 grants to those that were shortlisted but unsuccessful). We’re already on track to have at least $100,000 to grant this time next year.

Five Bucks is attempting to do low-value, high-volume giving at scale but like many early-stage collective giving initiatives, we’re volunteer-run with no operational funding, so we have to be creative about growth. Our greatest asset is the amazing community, made up of more than 500 Buckaroos from across Australia, so our second year will be about how we grow in a way that is sustainable, focusing on engaging our existing members to help us find new ones.

4. What sparked the idea of Five Bucks?

I’ve worked in the impact sector for my entire career and I’ve always been interested in how we can use capital to do good. I’ve also been frustrated by the myths and cynicism out there towards charities and administration. But what really sparked Five Bucks was learning about the steady decline in the number of Australians choosing to give and then reading that we give less overall than countries like the US, UK, Canada and New Zealand. Both things I learned through Philanthropy Australia reports.

In June 2024, I did a survey of ~200 people to better understand their attitudes towards giving. A strong theme that came through was futility – the idea that if you can only give a little bit, what’s the point? One response really stuck with me: “I feel like what I can give is a drop in the ocean.”  I wanted to show people that by chipping in a little bit – but with lots of other people – small change can have a big impact. I like the idea of ‘going small to go big’.

 The survey revealed that there was an appetite and capacity to give – but it was a question of how much. I wish I could say it was more profound, but I was sitting there one day grappling with this and thought, ‘I wonder if I could just get people to start chipping in $5 a week’. I thought creating regular giving behaviour – no matter the amount – was a good place to start to shift the culture.

5. Where is the fund held?

Five Bucks is a sub-fund at Australian Communities Foundation (ACF). They were a natural partner – excited about the idea because they were interested in backing innovative approaches to collective giving. They’re a great support and we wouldn’t have gotten through year one without them. Transparency about the fund is really important for members. At some of our events, we open up our ACF portal, pretty much our ‘bank account’, and show the audience what’s in there.

6. There is some deep philanthropic thinking behind your model and progressive practices such as a trust-based approach. How have you communicated what can be philanthropic jargon to a mainstream audience? 

There is deep thinking, but the magic is that people may not be aware of that when they first engage. From what we know, most are drawn to the simplicity of the idea and then once a Buckaroo, we get to share more and educate them about the model.

We generally avoid using language that might alienate people, even the word philanthropy. The language we use is ‘showing up’, ‘chipping in’, ‘playing your part’ – people can engage with that.

We took the onus of the due diligence work, researching charities and then inviting 20 to apply via a simplified application consisting of seven questions and 200-word answers. We explain the shortlisting and granting process to Buckaroos at our events and there is always a lot of interest in how it works.

A good example of introducing our members to a new idea was our $500 donations to unsuccessful organisations to compensate them for the time it took to apply. Most members had never heard of this being done, but when we made the announcement, so many of the email replies coming back were about how proud it made them that we did that.

Making the language of what the sector considers best practices – like Pay What It Takes, acknowledging the application burden, limiting donor dysfunction etc – relatable in the mainstream and accessible to everyday people is really important. And that education piece is going to be a big part of Five Bucks moving forward.

7. What is your big dream for Five Bucks?

Collective giving makes so much sense in a country like ours. While it can be hard to pin down our national identity, it’s fair to say: Aussies like chipping in. We like doing things together.

My big dream for Five Bucks is that we become one of the biggest giving communities in Australia. I hope we can inspire others to think differently about philanthropy – to see that sometimes, going small is how you go big.

There are real power dynamics in philanthropy and initiatives like Five Bucks have the potential to shift that, to return connection and agency to the communities we care about.

Hon Dr Andrew Leigh MP was an early supporter of Five Bucks, and like him, I believe in the potential of collective giving to bring people together, to build social cohesion. To show us we’re all part of a bigger whole.

Outside of Five Bucks, Brianna holds part-time positions at UNSW’s Centre for Social Impact, Monash Business School, Pale Blue and She Gives.

Brianna is part of Philanthropy Australia’s Collective Giving Advisory Committee, helping to guide and support the development of a national collective giving research project and strategy. 

Five Bucks members voted last week to distribute four $15,000 grants to the following NFPs: Eat Up, Seed Mob, The Westerman Jilya Institute for Indigenous Mental Health and Environmental Justice Australia. To learn more about the Buckaroos, visit the Five Bucks website.