breast cancer organizations

Breast cancer research and prevention thrives on charitable donations. National Breast Cancer Awareness Month is a great time to contribute to the cause. But with so many Pink Ribbon organizations out there, it can be hard to figure out where to donate. Office Ink is here to help. This week we’ll take a look at the best and worst breast cancer charities & organizations. Up first are the worst. With a little help from the folks at Charity Navigator and the American Institute of Philanthropy, we looked at three metrics:

Find out the worst Pink Ribbon charities & organizations

the ratio between program funding & fundraising expenditures;
transparency and accountability;
overall financial solvency.

From the fraudulent to the merely inefficient, here are our worst breast cancer charities.

	Coalition Against Breast Cancer CABC raised more than $9 million over five years, and spent the vast majority of that on fundraising fees, salaries and benefits, and personal goods. Less than 4% of collected donations went to charitable programs. That’s not just mismanagement, that’s a fraud. In fact, CABC is being sued by the state New York and this summer, the husband & wife team behind the organization plead guilty to grand larceny and scheming to defraud.
	American Breast Cancer Foundation ABCF spends most of the money they raise on more fundraisers. They are also sneaky. Their education & awareness programs are thinly disguised solicitations. Less than 3% of the money donated to the ABCF goes to research grants. And good luck trying to find out who runs the joint. The website doesn’t list board members or key staff.
	United Breast Cancer Foundation UBCF is the best of the worst in this lineup, spending a whole 40% of its 2010 budget on actual charitable activities. You’ll also find board members & key staff listed on their website. Still, there a far more efficient organizations to give to.
	Walker Cancer Research Institute Another organization that spends way more money on fundraisers than on fighting breast cancer and doesn’t provide nearly enough information about who runs the organization. In fact, aside from the crooks at CABC, the disparity between money spent on fundraising, versus money spent on breast cancer programs is the number one drawback of each organization in this list. Want to be sure your charitable donations will actually go to funding breast cancer research, prevention & patient support? We’ll have a list of the best breast cancer organizations Wednesday. Here’s a hint: Living Beyond Breast Cancer is on the list, and you can support them today by entering the Pink Ribbon Merchandise Giveaway from OnTimeSupplies.com.