Culture & Animals Foundation

What Culture & Animals Foundation does

The Culture & Animals Foundation (CAF) is a private nonprofit foundation founded in 1985 by animal rights philosopher Tom Regan and his wife Nancy Regan to advance animal advocacy through intellectual and artistic expression. The foundation is headquartered in Brooklyn, NY (Executive Director Martin Rowe) with historical and ongoing ties to Raleigh, NC, and North Carolina State University (NCSU) Libraries, where the Tom Regan Animal Rights Archive—the largest scholarly collection of animal rights and welfare materials in North America—is housed. CAF operates with a small staff of approximately 8 employees supplemented by interns from NYU and Columbia College.

CAF's core offerings are not commercial products but a portfolio of programmatic activities: (1) an annual grants program awarding up to $5,000 per project across Research, Creativity, and Performance categories ($40,000 disbursed across 14 grantees in 2026); (2) the Tom Regan Visiting Research Fellowship providing a $5,000 stipend for in-residence research at NCSU; (3) the Nancy Regan Arts Prize ($2,000 annual award, established 2021); (4) the annual Tom Regan Memorial Lecture (established 2018); (5) the Animals & Society Colloquium Series co-sponsored with the Animals & Society Institute and the American Sociological Association; (6) the CAF Festival; (7) the Martin's Act @200 audio documentary (2022–2023); (8) the Animals Agenda Digitization project (157 issues digitized); (9) the Recording Animal Advocacy Oral History Project; (10) Regan Audiobooks; and (11) the Chart2050 initiative. CAF's grant applications are processed through Slideroom during an annual January 1–31 window.

The foundation is funded by donations, processed through Zeffy (a fee-free donation platform), and operates as a charitable grantmaker. Revenue is not disclosed, and the foundation makes roughly $40,000–$50,000 in direct programmatic payouts annually. Its GTM motion is community-led and event-driven: an annual grant cycle publicized via website, newsletter, social media, and partner organizations, supplemented by fellowships, lectures, festivals, and an award program that build reputation and stimulate future applications. The 2026 cycle drew a record 658 applications from 89 countries, indicating demand well in excess of funded capacity.

Name

Culture & Animals Foundation

Legal name

Culture & Animals Foundation

Website

https://cultureandanimals.org

Company type

Private

Founded year

1985

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

The Culture & Animals Foundation is a 1985-established nonprofit that awards annual grants (up to $5,000), fellowships, and arts prizes to scholars and artists whose work advances animal advocacy through intellectual and artistic expression, supported by a global applicant base and a major archival partnership with NCSU Libraries.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Animal Advocacy Nonprofit Foundation

NAICS

Environment, Conservation and Wildlife Organizations (813312), Grantmaking and Giving Services (81321)

SIC

Services-Educational Services (8200)

akta.pro primary industry

Advocacy, Policy & Public Awareness (Animal Welfare) (BPAGAIAJ)

akta.pro secondary industry

Arts, Culture & Humanities Grantmaking Foundations (BPAGAKAJ)

Keywords

• Animal advocacy grants
• Nonprofit foundation
• Research fellowship program
• Animal rights arts
• Scholarly philanthropy

Headquarters

HQ city

Brooklyn

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices2 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Others

Revenue model

1. Annual Grants to Scholars and Artists: CAF provides annual grants of up to $5,000 to scholars and artists working on animal advocacy projects in three categories: Research (scholarly projects), Creativity (original artistic works), and Performance (public performances and exhibitions). The foundation awards fewer than 20 grants annually on average. In 2026, CAF made $40,000 available across 14 grantees.
2. Donations and Charitable Contributions: CAF raises funds through donations on its own platform (Zeffy) and likely through other charitable giving channels, as indicated by the prominent 'Donate Now' call-to-action on the website. The foundation is a nonprofit organization.
3. Nancy Regan Arts Prize: An annual award of $2,000 given to an individual or team who applied for a CAF grant that year or who had produced an outstanding body of work in support of animal rights. The prize was established in 2021 to honor co-founder Nancy Regan.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels4 records

Marketing channels8 records

Core offering

Culture & Animals Foundation is a nonprofit foundation that funds and curates programs supporting animal advocacy through intellectual and artistic expression. Its core offering is an annual grants program awarding up to $5,000 to individual scholars and artists across three categories—Research, Creativity, and Performance—supplemented by a research fellowship, an annual arts prize, lecture series, an archival preservation project, an oral history initiative, an arts festival, a colloquium series, and audio documentary productions. All program outputs (lectures, festivals, archives, documentaries) are made freely accessible online.

Product overview

The Culture & Animals Foundation operates as a unified grant-giving and programming organization rather than a technology product. The foundation advances animal advocacy through intellectual and artistic expression via a portfolio of interconnected programs: an annual grants program supporting research, creativity, and performance projects; the Tom Regan Visiting Research Fellowship for archival scholarship; the Nancy Regan Arts Prize recognizing outstanding artistic contributions; the Annual Tom Regan Memorial Lecture series; the Animals Agenda Digitization preserving 40 years of advocacy journalism; the Recording Animal Advocacy Oral History Project; Regan Audiobooks making philosophical works accessible; the CAF Festival showcasing artistic performances; the Animals & Society Colloquium Series supporting academic discourse; the Martin's Act @ 200 Audio Documentary exploring advocacy history; the Navab Fellowship training future advocates; and Chart2050 envisioning future advocacy strategies.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Tom Regan Memorial Lecture: Annual memorial lecture celebrating philosopher and CAF co-founder Tom Regan, delivered by leading scholars of animal rights.
• Nancy Regan Arts Prize
• Tom Regan Visiting Research Fellowship
• CAF Festival / Compassion Arts Festival
• Recording Animal Advocacy Oral History Project
• Martin's Act @200
• chart2050

Quantifiable outcome

• Grant recipients have gone on to become award-winning photographers, prize-winning authors, significant artists, and recognized authorities in the humanities and social sciences.
• +3 more outcomes

Named customers8 records

Segments4 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature3 records

Partnerships

Nine partnerships are on record, tiered minor and core.

• Alex Lockwood / Chart2050minorStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2022CAF co-produced the Martin's Act @200 audio documentary (2022–2023) with writer Alex Lockwood, the founder of Chart2050. The six-episode documentary series explores 200 years of animal advocacy history since the Cruel Treatment of Cattle Act (1822) and is available on Amazon, Apple Podcasts, Audible, and Spotify.
• NYU Animal and Environmental Studies ProgramsminorStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2019Since 2019, CAF has employed students and graduates from NYU's animal and environmental studies programs, providing professional development opportunities and generating content for CAF's communications and oral history projects.
• Columbia College — Navab Fellow Internship ProgramminorStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2019Since 2019, CAF has employed students from Columbia College's Navab Fellow Internship Program, which allows students to explore career paths and gain professional skills while contributing to CAF's communications and oral history projects.
• Compassion Arts FestivalminorStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2017In 2017, CAF joined Compassion Arts Festival to form the Compassion Arts & Culture and Animals Festival at Symphony Space in New York City, featuring music premieres, radio documentaries, lectures, film screenings, and performances. CAF has continued to support Compassion Arts Festival events in 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021.
• North Carolina State University Libraries — Special Collections Research Center (NCSU SCRC)coreStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2000In 2000, NCSU Libraries established the Tom Regan Animal Rights Archive in partnership with CAF. Together they created and fund the Tom Regan Visiting Research Fellowship ($5,000 annual stipend) for scholars to conduct research in the archive. The archive is the largest scholarly collection of animal rights and welfare materials in North America, containing papers from 20+ organizations.
• Animals & Society InstitutecoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCAF co-sponsors the annual Animals & Society Colloquium Series with the Animals & Society Institute and the American Sociological Association's Animals & Society Section. The series highlights research by emerging human-animal relationship scholars and also features publication workshops, job talks, and research by established scholars.
• American Sociological Association — Animals & Society SectioncoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCAF co-sponsors the annual Animals & Society Colloquium Series alongside the Animals & Society Institute and this ASA section, dedicated to highlighting research by emerging scholars in the human-animal studies field.
• American Anti-Vivisection Society (AAVS)coreGTM or Marketing PartnerIn 2026, CAF partnered with AAVS to co-sponsor two grants of up to $5,000 each for projects that critique, re-imagine, or reframe scientific exploration and consider responsibilities toward other-than-human animals. Works involving multimedia and interdisciplinary or science-related topics are encouraged.
• North Carolina State University Libraries — Animal Rights and Animal Welfare ArchivescoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCAF collaborated with NCSU Libraries' Animal Rights and Animal Welfare Archives to digitize and make freely available all 157 issues of The Animals' Agenda magazine (1979–2002), preserving decades of animal advocacy history.

Scale indicators5 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Regional players

• Compassion in World Farming: International farm animal welfare organization headquartered in the UK. Comparable in mission (advocacy for animals through awareness and policy change) but operates primarily in Europe with a more direct policy-campaign orientation.
• Born Free Foundation: International wildlife and animal welfare charity headquartered in the UK. Comparable mission of animal advocacy with conservation focus, but primarily serves UK/European audiences rather than the U.S. niche CAF occupies.

Broad incumbents

• The Humane League: Larger animal advocacy organization working on corporate campaigns and policy reform. Operates in the same broad advocacy space but at significantly greater scale and with a more direct-campaign orientation than CAF.
• People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA): Large, high-profile animal rights organization with global advocacy campaigns. Comparable in mission category (animal rights advocacy) but vastly larger, more confrontational in approach, and broader in scope than CAF.
• Humane Society of the United States (HSUS): One of the largest U.S. animal welfare organizations with broad programming across advocacy, rescue, and policy. Overlaps with CAF on advocacy mission but operates at vastly greater scale and scope.

Direct peers

• Faunalytics: Research and data-focused animal advocacy nonprofit providing evidence and analysis to the movement. Comparable to CAF in emphasizing rigorous research and intellectual infrastructure for animal advocacy.
• Animals & Society Institute: Co-sponsor with CAF of the Animals & Society Colloquium Series, focused on human-animal studies scholarship. Operates in the same niche of funding interdisciplinary animal advocacy research and academic discourse.
• Animal Legal Defense Fund: Uses legal scholarship and litigation to advance animal rights; comparable to CAF's emphasis on intellectual frameworks (law, philosophy) rather than direct sheltering or rescue services.
• American Anti-Vivisection Society (AAVS): Current co-sponsor of two $5,000 CAF grants in 2026. AAVS shares CAF's focus on animal advocacy through intellectual and critical examination of animal exploitation in science.
• New England Anti-Vivisection Society (NEAVS): Long-standing animal advocacy nonprofit funding research, education, and outreach against animal experimentation. Closely comparable to CAF in funding intellectually rigorous advocacy work rather than direct services.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• YouTubeyoutube.com/playlist?list=PLvGJzZaEU8p7mkjvQBFRq83Q3PxIpXgXu
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/culture-animals-foundation

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles10 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

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M&A

Investments

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Frequently asked questions about Culture & Animals Foundation