We Can help

What We Can help does

WeCanHelp (legally WeCanHelp gGmbH, also doing business as Bildungsspender) is a German non-profit limited liability company operating one of Germany's largest charity shopping platforms. Headquartered in Melsungen, the platform functions as an affiliate intermediary: users begin their online purchases through the WeCanHelp portal, which routes them to one of 33,788 partner retailers, and a portion of the resulting affiliate commissions is passed through as a donation to a registered charitable institution selected by the user. The core product surface is a free web portal at wecanhelp.de, supplemented by the Shop-Alarm browser extension (Chrome, Edge, Safari, Firefox), dedicated iOS and Android mobile apps, the WeCanHelp Mastercard co-branded with Mastercard, and a booklist management tool for schools and kindergartens. Underlying technology is straightforward affiliate tracking with browser- and app-based reminder tools to ensure donation attribution is not lost mid-purchase flow.

The business model is transaction-fee based and free for both end users and charitable institutions. WeCanHelp earns commissions on purchases made through 33,788 partner online shops, plus a share of interchange fees from the WeCanHelp Mastercard; users may also make direct donations through an online form. Go-to-market is primarily organic: institutions (13,939 registered facilities and project groups spanning kindergartens, schools, sports clubs, animal protection, and church/religious organizations) promote the platform to their supporters to drive traffic, while word-of-mouth, SEO, and partner retailer checkout integration provide top- and bottom-of-funnel reach. The organization is privately held as a gemeinnützige GmbH, with 1–10 employees, and operates exclusively in Germany. Cumulative donations facilitated through the platform total €14.81 million, though this figure represents gross charitable flow rather than the company's retained revenue.

Name

We Can help

Legal name

WeCanHelp gGmbH

Website

https://wecanhelp.de

Company type

Private

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

WeCanHelp gGmbH (Bildungsspender) is a German non-profit charity shopping platform that routes affiliate commissions from 33,788 partner retailers to 13,939 registered charitable institutions at no cost to shoppers, also offering a co-branded Mastercard, mobile app, and browser extension to expand donation capture.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Headquarters

HQ city

Melsungen

HQ country

Germany

HQ region

Europe

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Digital Commerce or Content

Cost components

Technology or R&D, Personnel, Marketing or Sales, Operations

Revenue model

1. Affiliate Commission (Transaction Fee): WeCanHelp earns commissions from 33,788 partner online shops when users make purchases through the platform. A portion of these commissions (typically 1% or more) is donated to the user's selected charitable institution. The platform acts as an affiliate中间商, redirecting shoppers to partner retailers and collecting referral fees.
2. WeCanHelp Mastercard Interchange: The WeCanHelp Mastercard generates donations based on card transaction volume. The platform receives a share of interchange fees that flows to the designated charitable organization.
3. Direct Donations: Users can make direct monetary donations to charitable institutions through an online donation form on the platform.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels4 records

Marketing channels5 records

Core offering

WeCanHelp (also operating as Bildungsspender) runs a German charity shopping platform that converts affiliate commissions from 33,788 partner online retailers into donations for 13,939 registered charitable institutions. Shoppers pay nothing extra, select a kindergarten, school, sports club, animal welfare cause, or religious organization to support, and a portion of each purchase routed through WeCanHelp is passed to that organization. The platform additionally offers a co-branded WeCanHelp Mastercard for in-store point-of-sale donations and a direct online donation form, with cumulative donations of €14.81 million routed to date.

Product overview

WeCanHelp operates as a charity shopping platform (also known as 'Bildungsspender') connecting shoppers with charitable causes. The core platform enables donations through affiliate shopping at 33,788 partner retailers without additional cost to users. The offering comprises a main web platform, the WeCanHelp Mastercard for card-based donations, the Shop-Alarm browser extension for shopping reminders, a mobile app, book list management tools, and a directory of 13,939 registered facilities. The platform has facilitated €14.81 million in donations to date. The product ecosystem allows users to select a specific kindergarten, school, sports club, animal welfare organization, or religious institution to receive ongoing support from their everyday purchases.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• WeCanHelp Mastercard: A Mastercard credit card that donates a percentage of spending to the user's chosen charitable institution
• Shop-Alarm

Products and services

• WeCanHelp Charity Shopping Platform Web-based charity shopping platform where users register, select from 13,939 charitable institutions, and shop at 33,788 partner retailers to generate donations through affiliate commissions at no extra cost to the shopper.
• WeCanHelp Mastercard Co-branded Mastercard that routes a share of interchange fees to the cardholder's selected charitable institution with every payment transaction at no extra cost to the user.
• Shop-Alarm Browser Extension Browser extension for Chrome, Edge, Safari, and Firefox that reminds users to route purchases through WeCanHelp to ensure affiliate commissions are tracked for the selected institution.
• WeCanHelp Mobile App Dedicated iOS and Android mobile application providing access to shop search, charity selection, donation tracking, and reminder features on smartphones and tablets.
• Booklist Tool (Bestelllisten) Tool that lets schools, kindergartens, and other facilities create and share book and school-supply lists with parents, with purchases generating donations through the WeCanHelp platform.

Quantifiable outcome

• €14.81 million total donations collected for charitable institutions
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers20 records

Segments6 records

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature4 records

Partnerships

Seven partnerships are on record, tiered core.

• Mastercard (WeCanHelp Mastercard)coreTechnology or IntegrationWeCanHelp has partnered with Mastercard to offer a co-branded charity card. Cardholders can designate a charitable institution to receive donations with every payment made. This partnership extends the platform's donation capability from online shopping to physical retail locations.
• AmazoncoreChannel Partner/ Reseller/ DistributorAmazon is one of 33,788 partner shops in the WeCanHelp network. When users access Amazon through the WeCanHelp platform and make purchases, a portion of the sale is donated to the user's selected charitable institution.
• OTTOcoreChannel Partner/ Reseller/ DistributorOTTO is a major partner retailer in the WeCanHelp shopping network, enabling donations from furniture and home goods purchases.
• Booking.comcoreChannel Partner/ Reseller/ DistributorBooking.com serves as a partner shop, generating donations for charitable institutions when users book accommodations through the WeCanHelp platform.
• ThaliacoreChannel Partner/ Reseller/ DistributorThalia (book retailer) is a key partner, enabling book and media purchases to generate donations for selected charitable institutions.
• REWE LieferservicecoreChannel Partner/ Reseller/ DistributorREWE grocery delivery service is a partner shop, allowing grocery purchases to generate donations for charitable causes.
• 33,788 Online Partner ShopscoreChannel Partner/ Reseller/ DistributorWeCanHelp has established affiliate partnerships with 33,788 online shops across Germany, including major retailers in categories such as travel, fashion, technology, office supplies, finance, and more. Each purchase made through these partners generates a donation for the user's selected institution.

Scale indicators4 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights4 records

Emerging players

• Stifter-helfen: Stifter-helfen is a German nonprofit-IT platform (initiated by Salesforce.org) that donates software licenses to nonprofits. It is adjacent rather than directly competitive, but it competes for the same "help nonprofits get more resources" mission and sometimes the same institutional relationships.

Broad incumbents

• betterplace.org: betterplace.org is Germany's largest online donation platform for nonprofits, allowing direct donations to registered charitable projects. It is broader in scope than WeCanHelp (direct donations vs. shopping commissions) but competes for the same nonprofit institutional accounts and donor mind-share.
• JustGiving: JustGiving is a major online fundraising platform for charities and individuals. While its core model is personal fundraising pages rather than affiliate shopping, it competes for charity mind-share in digital fundraising and represents the broader category of digital charity infrastructure WeCanHelp operates in.
• PayPal Giving Fund: PayPal Giving Fund enables charitable donations at checkout and through eBay listings, with a model that overlaps the "purchase-with-donation" concept at much greater scale. It is a broader infrastructure incumbent rather than a direct competitor but constrains WeCanHelp's expansion ambitions.

Regional players

• iGive.com: iGIVE is a US charity-shopping affiliate platform that routes a share of online purchase commissions to chosen causes. It is the same business model in a different geography and is a useful analogue for benchmarking monetization and conversion dynamics.
• Everyclick: Everyclick combines a search engine with charitable donations generated from search ad revenue. It overlaps with WeCanHelp on the broader concept of "everyday online activity generates donations," though the monetization mechanism is different.
• Give as you Live (GAYL): Give as you Live is a UK-based charity-shopping and cause-marketing platform with an affiliate model similar to WeCanHelp's. It is the most mature comparable in a non-German market and is a useful proxy for how the model scales in adjacent European geographies.

Direct peers

• HelpDirect: HelpDirect is a German donation platform supporting nonprofits and social projects, with functionality that intersects WeCanHelp's institutional onboarding and donation-routing capabilities. It represents a competing charitable giving hub in the same geography.
• Schulengel.de: Schulengel is another German affiliate-shopping donation platform with a comparable "shop and donate" mechanic, originally focused on schools. It overlaps with WeCanHelp (Bildungsspender) on both consumer-facing donation generation and the school/nonprofit institution side.
• Gooding.de: Gooding.de operates a German charity-shopping platform with a very similar affiliate-based donation model: shoppers start purchases through Gooding and a share of retailer commissions is routed to chosen nonprofits. It competes head-to-head with WeCanHelp for German shoppers and registered institutions.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat3 records

Customer concentration

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about We Can help