What £50k Can't Do - and Why We Keep Pretending It Can

There's a funny kind of charity folklore that floats around fundraising circles: "Give us £50k and we'll transform lives." Say it with a raised eyebrow, and most funders will quietly agree. Say it out loud? Somehow it gets weirdly uncomfortable.

Here's the truth: £50k isn't transformational. It's not life-changing. It's survival funding - sometimes barely that. But we keep acting like it's enough because it feels better than facing the real problem: our funding system is broken.

The Myth of Transformational Small Grants

You've probably felt this in your bones. You pitch for a grant, describe community impact, personalised support, structural change, and - if you're lucky - get offered a single year's worth of funding at £50,000. You celebrate. Then, six months later, you're already planning what to do next.

That's because tiny grants are often not transformative - they're temporary patches on long-term wounds. Research shows that in 2021, women's and girls' organisations in the UK received just 1.8% of all recorded charity grants, and over half of those were £10,000 or less. Even the average grant size into the sector is depressingly small compared with the scale of need.

And it's not just about the numbers. Small grants become traps when they're tied to project outputs rather than organisational sustainability. They demand reports, metrics, targets, but don't fund anything that actually lasts.

Women at Rochdale Women's Welfare Association

The Hidden Costs of Short-Termism

What's missing when we plaster together a funding portfolio made up of £10k and £50k increments? Everything we actually need to build strength. Things like:

Core costs - rent, salaries, systems, leadership time.

Reserves - to weather crises like a pandemic or economic downturn.

Strategic capacity - the space to think, plan and grow.

Most funders shy away from this kind of investment, preferring to tick boxes on specific project aims. The result? Organisations are left firefighting chaos instead of building resilience. A recent snapshot of grant-making trends shows that short-term, low-value grants still dominate the landscape and perpetuate systemic inequalities.

This is especially true for specialist women's organisations. We know that women's and girls' charities are not only underfunded but undervalued - they deliver life-saving services, fill gaps in public provision, and knit community resilience together in ways no one else does. Yet they get a tiny slice of the funding pie.

What Actually Creates Financial Sustainability?

So what does matter? The evidence is in:

Flexible, long-term investment beats short grants every time.

Big unrestricted grants, like the multi-year funding model championed by philanthropists such as MacKenzie Scott, show that when organisations receive flexible capital without strings, they rapidly strengthen financially and programmatically. In one study, 85% of nonprofits reported improved long-term sustainability and expanded impact after receiving unrestricted grants.

The lesson is clear: you cannot build structural change on a foundation of year-to-year project pots. Transformative impact - especially in the women's sector, where the challenges are deep and systemic - needs time, security, trust, and space.

Core funding isn't a luxury - it's essential

Funding that only covers project outputs while ignoring the backbone of an organisation is like giving someone food stamps but not letting them buy groceries. Yet too many funders still do this.

The Forever Fund is different. We don't pretend £50k is transformative. Instead, we commit to funding core costs, leadership development, and multi-year support, because real change doesn't happen in 12 months on a line-item budget.

Sustainability isn't a buzzword - it's a practice

Long-term funding allows organisations to:

• Invest in systems that free up staff time

• Attract and retain expert talent

• Build reserves that reduce stress and risk

• Plan multi-year strategies that address structural inequalities

That's what makes organisations stronger - and that's what makes communities stronger.

Why the Women's Sector Needs a Different Approach

If the women's sector demonstrates anything, it's that small grants applied again and again do not add up to systemic change. We've lived through austerity, rising demand for services, deepening inequality, and a funding landscape that treats survival as success.

But we also know that when the right kind of funding finds its way into women's organisations, the impact is enormous. These organisations are often the first responders to domestic abuse, financial exclusion, mental health crises, and social isolation. Yet, they remain persistently underfunded because their work challenges deep-seated structures of inequality.

That's why the Forever Fund was created - as an antidote to the myth that small, short-term grants are enough. We're here to fuel change that lasts. Not year by year. Decade by decade.

Sign our petition that calls for a long-term, independent funding model for the women's sector.