For when the math gets harder.
CostMe is built on the cost of everyday decisions. For families navigating illness, crisis, or a low income, those decisions get harder. We're committing $1,000,000 by 2040 to six Canadian charities working that exact edge, funded by five percent of every subscription dollar.
Donated to date
$0
Goal
$1,000,000
Deadline
January 2040
Updated annually. Receipts published every January.
How we fund the pledge.
Five percent of every subscription dollar, across Opal, Flint Pro+, and Founders Lifetime, goes into a restricted account. Once a year, on January 1, we distribute the year's accumulated balance across the six charities below. The donations are public. The receipts are public. The people doing the hard work get funded by the people who use the product.
- Opal monthly ($7.99)$0.40 per month per member
- Flint Pro+ monthly ($19.99)$1.00 per month per member
- Founders Lifetime ($149.99)$7.50 one-time per member
Net of payment-processing fees. The remaining 95% covers product, infrastructure, and the team.
Six Canadian charities we fund.
Mental health
Canadian Mental Health Association
BN 10686 3657 RR0001 · cmha.ca
One in five Canadians experiences mental illness in any given year. Financial stress is both cause and consequence: lost income during episodes, gaps in coverage, medication costs uncovered by provincial plans. CMHA operates the country's largest community mental-health network: 330 service locations, the BounceBack cognitive-behavioural program, and the peer-support and recovery infrastructure most Canadians use before they ever reach hospital care.
We donate because financial decision-making is harder when the prefrontal cortex isn't running at capacity.
Verify on the CRA charities listingSuicide prevention
CMHA Alberta (Centre for Suicide Prevention)
BN 10686 3491 RR0001 · cmha.ab.ca
Suicide is the second leading cause of death among Canadians aged 15 to 34. The Centre for Suicide Prevention, now embedded in CMHA Alberta, runs the country's only dedicated training, workshops, and clinical resources for community workers who intervene before crisis becomes irreversible. Financial distress is a documented precipitating factor in suicide risk.
We donate because the relationship between money and mental survival is not metaphorical.
Verify on the CRA charities listingYouth mental health
Jack.org
BN 84852 1837 RR0001 · jack.org
Founded after the death of Jack Windeler at Queen's University. Operates Canada's largest peer-led network for young people aged 12 to 30, training thousands of youth in mental-health first response, suicide intervention, and peer-led education. Reaches student populations that adult-led mental-health systems systematically fail to reach.
We donate because the financial habits formed before age 25 shape the next sixty years, and habits don't form well when mental-health support arrives a decade late.
Verify on the CRA charities listingChronic disease
Diabetes Canada
BN 11883 0744 RR0001 · diabetes.ca
Over 11 million Canadians live with diabetes or prediabetes. Lifetime medication, monitoring, and complication costs systematically erode savings rates: a person with Type 1 diabetes pays an estimated $1,500 to $15,000 a year in out-of-pocket costs not covered by provincial plans. Diabetes Canada funds research, advocacy, and the diabetes-camps infrastructure that supports newly diagnosed children.
We donate because chronic illness compounds financial decisions across decades, not weeks.
Verify on the CRA charities listingFinancial empowerment
Prosper Canada
BN 89734 4560 RR0001 · prospercanada.org
The only national charity dedicated to expanding economic opportunity for Canadians living on low incomes. Operates the Financial Empowerment Champions program and the policy infrastructure behind Canada's tax-benefit-access work. Each year, their programs unlock millions in unclaimed federal benefits for households who would otherwise leave money on the table.
We donate because the opportunity-cost math underlying CostMe is most consequential for people who can least afford to miscalculate.
Verify on the CRA charities listingPulmonary fibrosis
Canadian Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation
BN 850554858 RR0001 · cpff.ca
Pulmonary fibrosis is progressive, irreversible scarring of lung tissue with no cure. Median survival post-diagnosis is three to five years without lung transplantation. Families navigate years of oxygen-therapy costs, transplant-evaluation travel, drug regimens uncovered by provincial plans, and caregiver-leave income loss. CPFF is the only national PF community in Canada: patient registries, research funding, advocacy, and clinical infrastructure.
We donate because the math behind every financial decision tightens when the operating budget is finite breath.
Verify on the CRA charities listingWhy a 16-year horizon?
Big commitments need long horizons. $1M by next year would either be unrealistic or trivial, and neither serves the cause. 2040 gives us a meaningful target while making the math possible for a founder-funded company. As CostMe grows, this goal grows. If we hit $1M before 2040, we'll publish the next pledge the same day.
- Isn't this just marketing?
- Maybe. But the donations are public, the foundations are real, the receipts get published every January. Read it as marketing if you want. It still funds the work.
- What if CostMe shuts down before 2040?
- Whatever has accumulated in the restricted account gets donated immediately, split across the six foundations equally. The pledge is structured so it survives the company.
- Why only six foundations?
- Concentration matters more than coverage at this scale. Six is enough to spread the bet across mental health, chronic illness, and financial empowerment without spreading too thin to matter.
- Can we suggest a foundation?
- Yes. Email pledge@costme.io with a name and a paragraph on why. We add new foundations only when we've done the diligence.
We do the math. So does the giving.
Every CostMe decision is a small calculation about what money is worth. For the families these charities serve, that calculation is never small. This pledge is how we put weight behind that, five percent at a time.