Nov 27, 2018
Meet Scot Chisholm, CEO & co-founder of Classy - A social enterprise fundraising software focused on helping non-profits grow their revenue. Classy was named while he and his friends were first brainstorming the concept of Classy while watching Anchor Man - Stay Classy San Diego. Classy is now a 200+ employee SaaS startup that has now processed over $1 billion in funds for non-profits through its platform.
Scot grew up in Massachusetts and went to UMass Amherst where he spent only one semester as a computer science major before switching to engineering. He was drawn to San Diego when his college friends had moved out here while he was finishing college. When he graduated he convinced his dad and brother to drive cross-country with him and he landed in Ocean Beach. The day he got here he saw a pizza shop that advertised ‘Boston-style pizza’. He was curious and stopped in. As it so happens, this was the first day the shop was open and he asked if he could be their first employee. And he was hit by the entrepreneurship bug. If you’re curious to know which pizza place this is (it’s still around!), listen to the full episode.
While serving pizzas he talked to a lot of customers, one of whom worked at Booz Allen Hamilton (BAH) which is how Scot ended up at his job there. During his time at BAH he started Classy as a side project. It came to be that he and his friends had all been affected by cancer in some way and they wanted to volunteer with the American Cancer Society (ACS). Unfortunately, it was hard to get involved and their only option was the Walk For The Cure. Being in their mid-20’s, Scot and his friends all agreed that there had to be a different way to help than walking for 24 hours. They decided to do a pub crawl around Pacific Beach to raise money.
You’d think it’d be really easy to GIVE an organization like the ACS monetary donations. Turns out, it’s not. He was told he’d have to attend the Walk For The Cure and donate the money through that event. The same event they wanted to avoid.
And Classy was born. Classy didn’t start as a tech company. It started as an organization that held events to engage with the people who would donate, so they knew what exactly they were donating to. And these were no small events - they held a music festival and were able to get headliners like Matisyahu, Bassnectar, Mason Jennings and attracted more than 5,000 people. Their tangled system of payment software soon wasn’t able to support them anymore and only then did they set out to become a tech company to create a solution that would work for them. This was around 2009-2010 and was first a way for people to purchase tickets and donate money to their specific events. Once the organizations learned about Classy they started approaching Scot asking if they could use the platform to collect donations that weren’t tied to a certain event. Lightbulb moment.
Fast-forward and Classy was now in the UCSD Springboard program, CONNECT. Getting investors and support was a challenge since they were an events company trying to pivot to SaaS. It’s hard to imagine that these same people are questioning their judgment now that Classy just hit 1 billion dollars in collected donations!
Listen to the full episode to hear how he and Classy went full circle with the ACS which includes what could have been a very awkward conversation with their CFO.
Scot describes the San Diego tech scene as being a 2.0 version and he’s proud to be one of the leaders in this stage. During 1.0, Scot looked up to companies like Active. For 2.0, he’s looking to non-San Francisco based companies who are integrating and developing their cities as they grow, companies like HubSpot and MailChimp
Hear Scot talk more about their path to funding and San Diego’s interest in mission-driven companies, Classy’s growth in Downtown San Diego, and what he thinks the future of e-commerce philanthropy will be.
Check out Scot’s favorites:
Tacos - Ortiz’s Taco Shop in Point Loma and Colima's Mexican Food in North Park.
Coffee - Pappalecco, more recently it’s Peets who ‘has the best espresso’.
Beer - Sculpin. Alpine Brewing is also a new favorite.
Find Scot and follow Classy:
Classy.org - there’s a very active blog that Scot recommends you read
LinkedIn: Classy | Scot Chisholm
Twitter: @classy | @scotchisholm
Instagram: classy_org
Thanks to Cox Business for their support of the local San Diego startup ecosystem and for helping to make this episode possible.