The idea is similar to retail giant Amazon’s discontinued AmazonSmile program that let shoppers steer commissions to charities. Amazon ended the program in February after 10 years.
At the start, Give Freely’s browser extension works on 10,000 online stores including Best Buy, Walmart, and Hilton. And users can pick from among 1.1 million charities including The Multiple Sclerosis Society, UNICEF USA, and the March of Dimes.
“When I came across this idea of using a shopping extension as a way to get ordinary folks much more engaged with their favorite charities and generate potentially hundreds of millions of dollars … wow, I thought that would be a great mission to chase,” Kaufer, 61, said in an interview.
All of the commissions go to charity and Kaufer is paying the company’s expenses out of his own pocket to start. If Give Freely attracts a sizable user base, Kaufer said, it could become self-sustaining by selling advertising.
The fully remote new company, which employs seven people, isn’t likely to grow anywhere near as large as Tripadvisor, Kaufer said.
Started in a small office over a pizza shop in Needham in 2000, Tripadvisor attracted tens of millions of consumers to post reviews about hotels and tourist sites. Its stock market value peaked at $12 billion in 2015.
But the company fell on hard times as Google went after its business and then the pandemic crushed the travel industry. Kaufer departed as chief executive in May, 2022, and was replaced by Matt Goldberg. Tripadvisor’s market cap is around $2 billion today.
Kaufer’s decision to focus on philanthropy matches the desire of several other successful Boston founders who recently decided to use their entrepreneurial skills to make the world a better place. ButcherBox cofounder Mike Filbey’s startup Pepper helps young people give to charity. And HubSpot cofounder Brian Halligan started an investment fund called Propeller Ventures to invest in startups developing ocean-related technologies to mitigate climate change.
Even if Give Freely does not become as large as Tripadvisor, Kaufer said, he hopes the impact on philanthropy would be significant.
“If I’m lucky enough to make this a similar success with the community aspect of having tens of millions of people around the globe, I will be super proud to have had a hand in delivering that,” Kaufer said.
Aaron Pressman can be reached at aaron.pressman@globe.com. Follow him @ampressman.
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