The headline fee is only the visible part. Enter what your supporters will give and see what your program actually keeps on each platform — and what happens in year two, where the comparison really gets decided.
Assumptions: average one-time gift $40; booster figured at its flat 10% platform fee on a typical $25/mo team subscription (teams set their own price; Stripe 2.9% + $0.30 per charge). Every rate is sourced and dated on the fee table. This is planning math, not a quote.
| Platform | Supporters give | Program nets (yr 1) | Cost of fundraising | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| booster — ours | $8,000 | $6,880 | $1,120 | net of 10% + ~4% Stripe on a typical $25 sub (teams set price) |
| Snap! Raise | $8,000 | $6,400 | $1,600 | if participation goal met — below-goal rate unpublished; donors pay ~4% processing on top |
| Vertical Raise | $8,000 | $6,120 | $1,880 | midpoint of reported 17–24% + 3–4% processing |
| FanAngel | $8,000 | $7,200 | $800 | 7% + ~3% processing |
| 99Pledges | $8,000 | $7,624 | $376 | 0% + 3.49% + $0.49 (avg $40 gift) |
| GoFundMe | $8,000 | $7,712 | $288 | one-time gifts; recurring donations cost 5% more |
| Double Good | $8,000 | $4,000 | $4,000 | supporters buy popcorn; team keeps 50% of sales |
Every campaign platform on this table restarts at $0 next season. booster's model instead sustains this goal with about 27 monthly team supporters at a typical $25 (teams set their own price) — who keep paying through the off-season, so year two starts at full run-rate instead of zero. High churn erases that advantage; low churn compounds it. That trade — effort every year vs. content every week — is the real decision, and it's laid out honestly in booster vs. Snap! Raise.
"Cost of fundraising" is not just the platform fee. It's platform fee + card processing + (for product sales) the share of each dollar that buys the product instead of funding your program. It deliberately excludes the biggest hidden cost — volunteer and coach hours — because that one's yours to price: a rep-run Snap! campaign costs the most money and the least time; a 99Pledges a-thon is the reverse.
Why booster's 10% shows a bigger cost than the free tools and still ranks #1 here: the rubric weights revenue durability at 30%. One-shot campaigns buy you this year; subscriptions buy you a base that persists. If your program fundraises once and never again, use 99Pledges and keep the 96% — genuinely. If you fundraise every August, the reset is the most expensive line item nobody prices.
v1 limitations, stated plainly: donor tips (GoFundMe prompts), prize costs (rep-led platforms), and below-goal penalty rates (unpublished) are not yet modeled. They all push all-in costs up, not down.