Origin Story
MonkeyPod began in 2015 as a hobby project by founder Adam Huttler. During his 17 years of building tech and business infrastructure for the nonprofit sector, Adam had heard the same weary complaints time and again. Nonprofits are overextended, under-resourced, and mostly ignored by mainstream business software providers. Tools like QuickBooks and Salesforce claim to serve the nonprofit community, but they don't really understand our needs (to put it charitably).
The vision behind MonkeyPod was to solve this problem once and for all — a single, affordable system with real nonprofit accounting at its core and seamlessly integrated tools for fundraising, donor management, and collaboration. We spent 5 years building, testing, and refining. By 2020, we couldn't wait to share our work with the field.
What's in a Name?
The monkeypod (or monkey pod) tree is seen throughout the Hawaiian islands, where MonkeyPod (the company) is based. Not only are these trees beautiful, but they make an extraordinary contribution to our natural environment. Monkeypod trees:
- are an eco-friendly source of renewable hardwood
- feed vital nitrogen to the surrounding soil
- produce edible seeds for people and livestock
- can sequester as much as 28.5 tons of CO2 annually
We think these trees are pretty amazing, and a great model for the kind of company we aim to be!
MonkeyPod Foundation is our nonprofit sibling organization. The foundation is governed by representatives of the organizations that use MonkeyPod. Its mission is to provide education, training, and other forms of support to emerging nonprofit leaders.
MonkeyPod Foundation is also the official owner and steward of the Open Source version of MonkeyPod software.
Open Source Edition
As part of our commitment to supporting nonprofits of all shapes and sizes, MonkeyPod is also available in a free (as in speech and as in beer) open source version.
Organizations that want (or need) total control over their technology systems can download the application and any number of modular add-ons to assemble the perfect set up for their needs. Customize it, extend it, integrate it with your other systems, rip it apart and put it back together. It's entirely up to you.
Open Source Edition