1 877 Kars for Kids
K-A-R-S Kars for kids
1 877 Kars for Kids
Donate your car today
Those are the lyrics to the most maddeningly catchy jingle on the radio today. I looked for an audio link to embed in this blog, but couldn’t find one. That’s probably a good thing, because trust me you’d end up with the melody kicking around the inside of your head for at least the next two hours.
So that got me to thinking. The song itself is evil genius — a marketer using all the unfair advantages of auditory cocaine to the company’s benefit. But that’s balanced out by the positive dividend, right? I mean after all the song is a means (a vehicle?) for raising money for some worthy causes.
But what are the worthy causes? They don’t really say in the ad. All we know is that it benefits Kids, or maybe Kidz since they don’t spell that part out in the lyrics.
Well, after a search on the web, it turns out that Kars for Kids is affiliated directly with “Oorah” a camp in upstate New York. Kars for Kids gives its donations exclusively to Oorah. And Oorah is a camp to bring the teachings of Orthodox Judaism to children of non observant Jews.
So, it seems like Kars for Kids has a great business model: they provide a service to people who get a tax write off of $500 (no expense for Kars for Kids) for donating their car; Kars for Kids then sells the parts or auctions the car for likely considerably more than $500, and provides the proceeds to help run the camp and spread the gospel….well not the gospel, but the talmudic equivalent. The money definitely goes to Oorah, but Kars for Kids is not really a 3rd party but a subsidiary of Oorah. I wonder how much the counselors are paid.
Nothing they are doing is illegal. But the whole thing seems very unethical…clearly the extra K is not for Kosher. Especially when the song is looped through about five times in the 30 second ad, but the details of the exclusivity (in both number and mission) of the charity involved is never mentioned. Maybe “Kars for teaching Orthodox Judaism in upstate New York to Kidz” would throw off the meter. But I’m guessing it was a purposeful decision to appeal to a wider audience who might think their donations are going to help kids combat a more life threatening condition than secularism.
Shim, I think you’ve sold the Kars4kids program a little short. http://www.kars4kids.org/joy.htm explains their mission clearly and its made to sound much larger and more important than just about Oorah, which is one of the many organizations and missions they fund. More importantly, they don’t hide their mission, although they don’t go into the details in their 30 second spots (and I wouldn’t expect them to), because obviously the point is to get you to call in. So much about success is marketing, and this ad is particularly good.
Also, when you donate a car, I believe what happens is the junkyard first gets its cut of the profit and the organization gets the remainder. I know when I tried to get ride of Stacey’s car many years ago and no one would pick it up, not even the junkyard. I was very relieved finally to find the diabetes association, which agreed to come tow it away for free and give me a tax deduction based on the blue book value to boot! Today when you donate I believe you get a tax donations that is somehow related to the actual value of the car.
We used to belong to the YMCA, and we know what that stands for, although rarely will you ever hear much more than their initials. So, what do they do? They basically build large buildings, they don’t pay taxes because they are a “religious organization,” then they espouse “judeo-Christian principles” and try to build strong communities. They are able to undercut virtually every workout facility because they get corporations to donate money to them (tax free of course). The JCC also, I believe gets these same tax donations, but unlike the YMCA, the JCC does not actively seek out members from outside the Jewish community, whereas the YMCA clearly does. Therefore the YMCA is far larger and much more influential.
I hope I have served to blur the lines a little.
Nuni, I have a much better feeling for the JCC and YMCA which provides services to all individuals than for an organization that targets a very select group of people….and makes it seem that it is donating to all Kids.
Also, K4K had $8.9 Million revenue last year. 7.6 of that went to Oorah (the camp) and 1.3 went to advertising, so I don’t see the many organizations/charities that you see they are contributing to.
….just did a web search and found some interesting articles on Failedmessiah.com. Here’s a link of one (there are other more recent ones where the Oregon and NJ attorney generals have gone after K4K) which speaks directly to the really misleading nature of K4K and how they give money ONLY to Oorah.
Don, the taxpayer is responsible for tax deductions not the organization that stuff is donated to. As long as you are not audited you can claim whatever you want. If you do get audited, it needs to be current fair market value.
I was concerned about Donnie’s understanding of taxes, and then along comes Snevert. I wouldn’t really advise anyone to take the “as long as you don’t get audited you don’t have to pay taxes” approach.
OK, well if they are contributing that much to Oorah, than that is contrary to what they lead you to believe on their website. And I disagree with that. I don’t think you provided the link, so I wasn’t able to read about what has been happening.
The point I was trying to make was that “helping kids” can mean lots of different things to different people, and I wouldn’t expect their 30 second ad to necessarily describe what they do. In fact, “Cars for kids” is a program that help kids in a specific hospital. I guess it doesn’t bother me that they are trying to help just Jewish kids, just as it wouldn’t bother me if they were just trying to help all the kids in Gary, Indiana or just buddhist children in India. When I donated my car to the kidney foundation, for all I know they might have used all the car donation funds to study a particularly rare kidney disease, or to fund their holiday party. I didn’t ask, because they agreed to take my car away. If I did ask, though, I would expect a fair and truthful answer. So, if I call them up and they are deceptive, as you suggest, then I would agree with you. It sounds like they might be bending the truth a bit.
In terms of taxes, I typed “donations” when I meant to type “deduction”. This is from a website:
“if your car is valued at more than $500, the deduction is limited to the charity’s actual selling price. The donor must attach a statement of sale to the tax return in order to receive the deduction. (The charity is obligated to provide the statement within 30 days.) You are not entitled to know the deduction amount before donating your car.”
Surprisingly, Theo, the non-profit consultant, is seemingly unaware of this. It used to be you could put any value you wanted on your return (and just use the blue book value to corroborate the value- which provided a lot of leeway, because you determined the condition of the car, etc…but that is no longer the case.
Hospital?!? It’s a camp! And it’s run by the same people who run Kars for Kids. So they are donating the $$ to themselves!!! The more searches I do on this the longer the list of transgressions I see that they’ve been linked with: Tax evasion, deceptive advertising, sexual abuse. The insipid song should have been the first clue.
PS Nuni, the link to the article referenced in my earlier comment (there are many more, and more damaging ones on the web) can be accessed by clicking on the blue highlighted text “Only to Oorah”.
OK, I see the link now, thanks. But, you are trusting a website called “Failedmessiah.com”? Have you seen some of the other captions for articles:
How Fox Manipulates News In 3 Easy Steps
The Shame Of Israel:Elderly Holocaust Survivor Homeless In The Holy Land
Washington’s Gay-Friendly Orthodox Rabbi
Chabad Kidney Saves Satmar Man
Letter from Jerusalem: Women Want To Sit At The Back Of The Bus
The Forward Selectively Tells The 5WPR–Birthright Israel Story
Borough Park’s Glatt Kosher Gas Station
Are you kidding me? These are the religious fanaticals that won’t agree to peace in the Middle East. Am I supposed to assume these guys are the authority on such matters? Not by a long shot.
Let’s not forget what happened with the United Way (twice they got into hot water) and even Jerry Lewis was an addict and I think misappropriated funds. Most people seemed to forget about all that, although I never did.
If they lie and steal, cheat, etc, then I am mad. But I am not mad if their mission is solely to advance their own self-serving interests, even if it is for a small minority of the population. They have built a better mouse trap, with their free vacations and their catchy tunes, and they have been in business long enough for me to give them the benefit of the doubt. I think Kars4kids will be around for a long time yet to come.
Not sure how stories like “Chabad Kidney Saves Satmar Man” or “Washington’s Gay-Friendly Orthodox Rabbi” makes them religious fanatics. They seem to support gay rights, which is anything but religiously fanatic.
On your other points I think we’re basically in agreement but have different conclusions. You are not mad if Kars4Kids advance their own self serving interests and have found a way to cleverly market so that people may not realize the details. I am mad about it. I agree Kars4Kids will likely continue to succeed and be around for a long time. I just think it’s too bad that they’ve filled this car donation slot so effectively when I can think of so many other organizations that I think could use the $$ to do a much better good for society.
Anyone find it slightly funny what the organization’s initials are???
Umm, scratch that last post. I was looking at the thread title, not the organization’s name.
Your right Shim, but there is another element that I haven’t expressed well, which deserves some of your consideration. Namely, Chasidic Jews only fraternize with their own and they don’t call attention to their causes/beliefs (I believe this is in stark contrast to the Christian viewpoint, which is generally welcoming of outsider and which can be heard on any number of Sunday morning channels).
So, it makes perfect sense that Chasidic Jews wouldn’t write a jingle that draws attention to them and in that way, their appeal is consistent with their values and beliefs.
There is obvious something fishy here Don, but you can believe whatever you want.
Who would have thunk that Karz for Kidz would be the blog post that put Trees Falling in the Forest on the Map. I really thought it would be Mirror Mirror.
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