ShopForTerra is not a nonprofit, and it doesn't pretend to be one. It's a for-profit shopping gateway that earns money the same way most product-discovery sites do — through affiliate commissions and advertising — and then directs a fixed share of that revenue to environmental organizations as a matter of company policy. This article explains exactly where the money comes from, how it's split, and why the model is structured the way it is.
Where the revenue comes from
When you click a product on ShopForTerra and buy it from the linked retailer, that retailer pays a commission. The commission is paid by the merchant you buy from — not added to your price — and it flows through an affiliate network. Today those networks include Amazon Associates, Awin, CJ Affiliate, Rakuten Advertising, and Impact. Each network has its own commission structure: some pay a percentage of the sale (often 1–10%, varying by category), some pay a flat amount per action, and advertising slots shown on the site generate a smaller amount per impression or click.
The result is that ShopForTerra's revenue is a function of how many people use the site and how much they buy through it — but the shopper never pays more than they would have otherwise. The commission is funded by the retailer's normal marketing budget.
The 30/70 split, and why it's set as policy
Of the revenue ShopForTerra earns, 30% is donated to the environmental organizations listed on our Organizations page, and 70% is retained to cover the costs of running and improving the platform — servers, software, content, and the people who maintain it.
Two decisions make this structure meaningful rather than a marketing claim.
First, the 30% donation rate is set as company policy, not adjusted per click. This matters because it removes the temptation to quietly reduce giving when revenue is tight. A discretionary donation rate gives the operator an easy lever to cut; a fixed one removes it. You can see the current policy rate and an estimate of donations to date on the Transparency page.
Second, the donation is not tied to any individual purchase. This is deliberate, and it leads directly to the next decision.
Why we don't offer per-purchase cashback or rewards
A common question is why ShopForTerra doesn't return cashback, points, or "spin a wheel" rewards to the shopper the way some affiliate sites do. The short answer is that doing so would violate the terms of our affiliate relationships and, more importantly, it would undermine the integrity of our recommendations.
The Amazon Associates Program Participation Requirements, for example, state: "You will not offer any person or entity any consideration or incentive (including any money, rebate, discount, points, donation to charity or other organization, or other benefit) for using Special Links (e.g., by implementing any 'rewards' or loyalty program that incentivizes persons or entities to visit the Amazon Site via your Special Links)." Note the explicit mention of "donation to charity or other organization" — this is exactly why we don't tie our donations to individual clicks or purchases. Similar language appears across other major affiliate networks: you cannot pay or reward a user specifically for clicking an affiliate link. The reason networks enforce this is that per-click incentives distort traffic — they reward people for clicking, not for genuine interest, which degrades the value of the clicks to merchants.
If we paid shoppers to click, two things would happen: we'd risk being removed from the affiliate networks that fund the donations, and the "products" on the site would effectively become a vehicle for shifting cash to users rather than a genuine recommendation. The cleaner architecture is the one we use: the shopper pays the normal price, the merchant pays a commission, and 30% of that commission goes to environmental work. No one is incentivized to click anything they wouldn't have clicked anyway.
How the four partner organizations were chosen
The 30% is split evenly — 7.5% each — across four organizations chosen to cover different environmental failure modes rather than concentrate on one. The logic is that environmental impact is not a single problem; it spans materials and waste, ocean systems, and forests, so the donation portfolio should too.
- Ellen MacArthur Foundation focuses on the circular economy — redesigning how materials flow so waste and pollution are designed out rather than managed downstream. This connects to the products on this site that emphasize recycled, repairable, or circular materials.
- Ocean Conservancy applies science-based approaches to ocean health, including plastic pollution and marine protection.
- One Tree Planted funds reforestation in areas affected by deforestation, working where the link between forest cover and climate is most direct.
- Rainforest Alliance works at the intersection of agriculture, business, and forests — certifying and supporting producers who manage land responsibly.
You can read more detail on why each one was selected in its own article. The common thread is that each organization does work that maps to a category of environmental harm that the products we feature are trying to reduce.