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On Behalf Of Recipients, TisBest Gives Charitably

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 15, 2007

Updated: 12/14/2007 06:55 pm

Back in 1990, while he was in law school, Erik Marks came up with a great idea.

Took him 17 years to execute, but it's a dandy.

Marks is the founder of TisBest, a charity gift card company.

It works like this: Shoppers visit tisbest.org and purchase a tax-deductible gift card in an amount from $10 to $5,000. The "card" is e-mailed to the recipient, who then can donate the amount to one of more than 200 charities listed on the Web site.

It's the perfect gift for the person who has everything and for the socially conscious.

Marks rolled out his company just in time for the holiday season.

"Back when I came up with the concept, the Internet didn't exist and gift cards didn't exist," says the 40-year-old Seattle resident. "I see it as an idea whose time has come."

How many times have we struggled to find the perfect present for a relative or friend who tells us repeatedly, "I've got everything I need." Yet we feel obligated to come up with something. And we know darn well some of those gifts end up in the back of the closet, re-gifted to someone else or on a table at a yard sale.

After working in law, real estate development and at a construction waste recycling company, Marks resurrected the idea that came to him so many years ago. He calls the TisBest charity card a gift that pleases people on both sides.

It shows that the giver is a person who cares about the world. For the recipient, it's a feel-good opportunity to help out a favorite charity. After all, how many shirts from Macy's do we really need?

"I think gifts are about building relationships. This card does it better than a store-bought item," he says.

He and his co-workers selected the charities, picking a range of causes and issues. They've been divided into 16 categories, such as Children, Peace and Nonviolence, and Community Building. There's a link to each charity's Web site so the recipient can understand how that donation will be used.

The company also takes steps to ensure the charities are legitimate. All receive significant public support, have demonstrated fiscal and social responsibility, and have their financial and regulatory data subject to third-party review on guide

star.org or charitynavigator.org. Most have annual revenues or assets of at least $3 million.

The purchaser can select a personalized background for the e-card, such as a nature scene or a holiday theme.

TisBest earns a transaction fee of $3.95 per card, no matter the purchase amount. Marks, who invested much of his own money to launch the company, continues to practice law part time to pay the bills.

He also volunteers once a month at a gospel mission, giving free legal advice to people trying to turn their lives around, and has gone on a mission trip to work with orphans in Romania.

He also likes the environmentalist angle to the cards. If every person gave just one $25 TisBest charity gift card instead of some other gift, he says, "we would contribute $4.2 billion to charity. That's enough money to protect 66,000 square miles of rainforest or to provide health care for 1 million uninsured children."

According to TisBest, Americans generate some 5 million extra tons of waste between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day, from greeting cards to wrapping paper to shopping bags. Because the charity gift cards can be purchased online and e-mailed to the recipient, Marks says it's an Earth-friendly gesture.

"If everyone gave just one charity card rather than a wrapped gift, we'd save enough paper to cover 15,000 football fields and save 38,000 miles of ribbon - enough ribbon to tie a bow around the entire Earth," he says.

I'm not quite sure how he calculated all these comparisons. But it makes sense. So if you're making a list and checking it twice, think about putting something nice on it. We need more people like Erik Marks, who are doing their part in making this world a better place.

For more on the charity gift card, go to www.tisbest.org.

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