Benevolence Farm Case Study
CASE STUDY:
BENEVOLENCE FARM REACHES FINANCIAL STABILITY WITH THE HELP OF GOOD STEWARD FINANCIAL COMPANY, LLC
Executive Summary
With roots running deep in the soil of rural North Carolina, Benevolence Farm is cultivating leadership, promoting sustainable livelihoods, and reaping structural change for women impacted by NC’s criminal justice system.
But in 2018, the social enterprise was struggling financially. Maintaining accountability and transparency with such a wide variety of programs, income streams, and expenses had become overly time consuming, and keeping track of it all seemed nearly impossible.
When the outgoing executive director recommended reaching out to a bookkeeper, Good Steward Financial Company, LLC, stepped in. The Good Steward team cleaned up Benevolence Farm’s financial records, put systems in place, and helped the nonprofit build knowledge of their financial infrastructure.
Today, Benevolence Farm is flourishing. With Good Steward managing the books and providing the accountability and transparency the nonprofit needs, current Executive Director Kristen Powers is free to focus on higher level leadership and fundraising. She can easily track spending against grants and rest well knowing exactly where the nonprofit’s finances are.
THE INABILITY TO TRACK CASH FLOW MADE MAINTENANCE AND SUSTAINABILITY REALLY DIFFICULT, AND THE NONPROFIT’S FINANCIAL STRUGGLES DISTRACTED IT FROM ITS MISSION.
The Story of Benevolence Farm
Benevolence Farm is a nonprofit social enterprise working with formerly incarcerated women in rural North Carolina to provide employment and housing support through a 13-acre farm in Alamance County.
“We’re an organization that works specifically with women who are coming home from incarceration settings, so we have more of a gender justice focus than a lot of other organizations,” says Powers. “We’re also working to build communities where problems and conflicts are met in the community and not through the criminal legal system.”
“Good Stewards grown with us and learned with us. Their responsiveness and willingness to adjust to our needs has been incredible. I can’t image working with any other bookkeeper.”
Kristen Powers, Executive Director
The Challenges Facing Benevolence Farm
Prior to working with Good Steward, Benevolence Farm had been struggling with finances for several years, and a lot of things had gone undone as a result.
Why Benevolence Farm Chose Good Steward Financial Company
The outgoing executive director recommended bookkeeping services to improve the nonprofit, and another socially responsible entrepreneur that works with GoodSteward introduced Benevolence Farm to Jasmine Simpson. They knew of her work with other reputable local organizations and found that her ability to talk through the issues, listen, and understand where they were and where they wanted to go gave them confidence that Good Steward would fit in well with their organization and its mission.
Executive Director
“We run many different programs even though we’re small, and we have several different income streams as well as expenses and types of expenses. It was time consuming and difficult for the director to keep track of it all. As I was transitioning to the executive director role, we were coming out of that difficult financial period. During that time, if something hadn’t been an immediate fire that needed to be put out right away, we’d had to let it go. When we finally regained some stability and could get out of crisis mode, we had retrospective work to do. We needed to make sure that everything was aligned, that we were doing our best to stay in compliance, and that we knew what was happening in our own organization.”
How Good Steward Financial Company Responded
With patient insistence and focus, Good Steward stepped in to guide the BenevolenceFarm leadership team.
“Jasmine put us through a little bit of a boot camp at firstbecause we had to go through almost two years of financial records that were notcleaned up,” Powers says. “She helped us go through all the transactions line-by-linefrom when we hired Good Steward in January 2020, all the way back to 2018. GoodSteward also set up systems, took over payroll, started managing our financial reports,and assisted with our budget. They’ve helped us build systems to make sure we knowwhat our finances are and where they’re going.”
I can focus on fundraising and have trustworthy books to send to grants or foundations. We can prove we’re a well-run organization and face audits with confidence.
The Results
With new systems in place, Benevolence Farm’s financial picture has turned around completely.
“We’re in a much more financially stable place. We know where all our money is, where it’s coming from, where it’s going,” explains Powers. “I’m able to track spending against the grants we receive, and I feel at ease knowing things are being taken care of. That mental lift is helpful. I know our payroll is going to get paid, we’ll pay our sales taxes, and our monthly reports will be sent to us. This makes my job a lot easier. I can focus on strategy and higher level thinking instead of the nuts and bolts of every day.”
If your accounting system is complex and outdated, reach out to the Good Steward Financial team to see how we can help you get your time back with fully automated and integrated bookkeeping. Schedule your FREE consultation today.
