Our Finances

Finances always seem to be such a hot topic.  Everyone always seems to want to keep things secret.  We have no idea why.  If you are honest about what you are doing, we think releasing financial information helps build trust.  So here goes:

Our foundation has a working relationship with Festivals Unlimited, Inc., a privately held company with no one affiliated with our foundation.  They produce great events and are very experienced.  Being "normal" Americans, they also go out of their way to make as much money as possible, while still putting on great events.  With their help, we now produce the Cincy Winter Beerfest and two Columbus Beerfests each year.  And we are investigating several more cities right now.  Our foundation is legally responsible for everything at these events.  Bill Hulsizer signs the liquor permits and is personally responsible (of course we have a $3,000,000 insurance policy on each event, too).  That's why he attends every event and is always on the lookout for any potential issues.  So far we've had none and we want to keep it that way.  Our events are celebrations of life and we want everyone to be happy.

Our basic deal with Festivals Unlimited is that when all is said & done, we receive 20% of the net profits from each event.  We did a lot of searching and found very few large charity events that end up making more than this.  Believe it or not, most of the ones we found were closer to 10%.  To get an alcohol permit in Kentucky, the charity only needs to receive 10%, but we still receive 20%.  So we think this is a pretty good deal, especially since Festivals Unlimited takes care of all details of promotions, management and operations.  Starting January 1, 2012, Festivals Unlimited is becoming their own 501-c(3) non-profit whose mission is to raise as much money as possible for music education for children.  They will assume all responsibility and risk themselves and have promised to continue granting 20% of the net proceeds to our foundation.  Free money with no risk.  Gotta like it !!!

So, here are the high-level results of our Beerfests.  Prior to 2010, the beerfests were produced by Festivals Unlimited and we got a donation from them.  These were much smaller and we don't have full financial results for them.

May 20 & 21, 2011 - Columbus Summer Beerfest

Total Income ---------------------- $144,159.00

Total Expenses ------------------ $122,396.10

Net Profit ---------------------------- $21,762.90

Festivals Unlimited share --- $17,410.32

Big Joe Duskin share --------- $4,352.58

February 11 & 12, 2011 - Cincy Winter Beerfest

Total Income ---------------------- $191,502.53  

Total Expenses ------------------ $127,644.23

Net Profit ---------------------------- $63,858.30

Festivals Unlimited share --- $51,086.64

Big Joe Duskin share --------- $12,771.66

January 14 & 15, 2011 - Columbus Winter Beerfest

Total Income ---------------------- $142,297.00

Total Expenses ------------------ $98,824.20

Net Profit ---------------------------- $43,472.80

Festivals Unlimited share --- $34,778.24

Big Joe Duskin share --------- $8,694.56

May 29 & 30, 2010 - Columbus Summer Beerfest

Total Income ---------------------- $83,400.00

Total Expenses ------------------ $65,925.37

Net Profit ---------------------------- $17,474.63

Festivals Unlimited share --- $13,874.63

Big Joe Duskin share --------- $3,600.00

January 30, 2010 - Cincy Winter Beerfest

Total Income ---------------------- $87,971.00

Total Expenses ------------------ $60,604.00

Net Profit ---------------------------- $27,367.00

Festivals Unlimited share --- $21,567 

Big Joe Duskin share --------- $5,800 

As you can see, we are making some money at these events.  90% of the proceeds from each city stays in a fund for that city and 10% goes into our fund for administrative expenses like printing & postage.  This also pays for our professional help, like our lawyer and accountant.