Increasing access to
high-impact solutions
The Wider Reach Program provides grants that enable underserved organizations and communities to access the innovative products and services backed by the impact investing industry. Grants will help low-income, rural, or otherwise underserved or under-represented groups receive innovative, high-impact services in healthcare, education, financial wellness, climate resilience, and more.
Our Hypothesis
The field of market-rate impact investing, which seeks superior financial returns alongside deep impact, has grown quickly over the past two decades. However, the influx of capital has not produced commensurate impact outcomes.
The highest-need customers are rarely the commercial segments high-growth start-ups go after first. In many cases, low-income, rural, or otherwise underserved and under-represented communities do not have access to the products and services impact investors have identified, diligenced, and backed. Mission-driven founders want to reach underserved customers but find these markets difficult to serve until they hit a more stable state of company maturity.
We believe private capital can effectively innovate and scale impact, but it is not always sufficient to ensure access and inclusion.
The SJF Institute aims to address this challenge by funding high-need organizations and communities to access high-impact products and services.
We are piloting a new grant program, Wider Reach, to validate this hypothesis with the following strategy:
Fund
Fund grants for high-need groups to access impact-driven products and services
Support
Provide impact measurement assistance and support to grantees
Catalyze
Help impact-driven enterprises reach underserved markets
Why it Matters
With this pilot program, we will provide grant funding to broaden access to the products and services identified and vetted by the impact investing industry. We hope to enable low-income, rural, or otherwise underserved and under-represented groups to more reliably access innovative services in healthcare, education, financial wellness, climate resilience, and more.
The Wider Reach Program aims to catalyze high impact opportunities to reach underserved customer segments and, in demonstrating the value of these projects, support their long-term adoption by the market.
