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The Divorced Dadvocate: Divorce Support For Dads
The Divorced Dadvocate: Divorce Support For Dads is a weekly podcast designed specifically for fathers navigating divorce. It addresses the unique challenges men face and offers practical guidance, emotional support, and real-life insights to help dads survive — and ultimately thrive — during and after divorce.
Each episode combines honest conversation, personal stories, and action-oriented advice to help listeners rebuild confidence, create healthy co-parenting strategies, manage finances, navigate court complexities, and heal emotionally. Since launching in 2020, the show has become a trusted resource and supportive community for divorced and divorcing dads.
*Become a community member and access full episodes and additional MEMBERS ONLY content: https://thedivorceddadvocate.com/membership-tiers/*
DISCLAIMER: The purpose of this podcast is to inform, not influence. It is not a substitute for professional care or advice by a qualified professional. The host, as well as guests who speak on this podcast, express their own opinions, experience, and conclusions, and The Divorced Dadvocate podcast & website neither endorses nor opposes any particular views discussed here.
The Divorced Dadvocate: Divorce Support For Dads
265 - Funding Fathers: A New Foundation for Divorced Dads
We're launching the Foundation for Fathers, and it's going to transform how we support dads navigating divorce. This nonprofit will provide free and low-cost resources, support groups, workshops, and legal education to fathers facing custody challenges—especially those without access to professional services.
What makes this announcement truly revolutionary is our partnership with Will Black, founder of Sharing The Credit. Will has pioneered a method that turns credit card processing fees into sustainable funding for charities like ours. Rather than these fees going to banks, they can be redirected to support divorced fathers without costing businesses a penny more. In fact, 98.5% of businesses actually save money while making a meaningful difference.
For divorced fathers, this partnership means more accessible coaching, free community memberships, and scholarship opportunities when they need it most.
If you know any business that processes credit cards—from restaurants to law firms, especially divorce attorneys—connecting them with us could help fund critical resources while potentially saving them money. Just twenty participating businesses could fund our programs for an entire year. Reach out to jude@thedivorceddadvocate.com to make a difference for fathers when they need support most.
Will's website: https://sharingthecredit.com
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How Are You Adjusting To Your Divorce? Find out in this quiz - http://www.thedivorceddadvocate.com/divorce-quiz.html
*FREE Dads Guide To Divorce* How to survive and thrive during and after divorce: http://www.dadsguidetodivorce.com
Don't suffer in silence! Get relief from the pain and confusion of your divorce and schedule your FREE, No Obligation Coaching Consultation - schedule a time directly into my schedule at www.TalkWithJude.com.
Join other divorced dads who have experienced or are experiencing divorce in this FREE Divorced Dads Online Meetup Group - https://www.meetup.com/Divorced-Dads-Meetup-Group/
Other Resources:
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The Divorced Dadvocate Facebook Group - https://www.facebook.com/thedivorceddadvocate/
Music credit: Akira the Don
Hello and welcome to the show. Thank you for tuning in again this week. I sincerely appreciate it. We've got an exciting announcement today that I'll be sharing with you. That's going to have a tremendous impact on the entire Divorced Advocate community and also directly to each and every one of you dads that is listening. But before I jump in, as usual, let's welcome our new members to the Divorced Advocate community. Those are Adam and V-Mac.
Speaker 1:Welcome to the Divorced Advocate community. If you are not part of it already, check it out at TheDivorcedAdvocatecom. There are resources for you wherever you're at in your divorce, wherever you are at financially from free to paid resources so go check it out. And what we're going to be talking about here is going to help with some and most all of those resources as well. So check it out at thedivorcedadvocatescom.
Speaker 1:Okay, on that topic of resources, what I have found in doing this work now for five years with your gentlemen is that during this process, it is a very difficult and challenging and chaotic time. I'm not telling you anything that you don't already know or you're not already experiencing, but that is in particularly true with your finances, and during this time your finances are strained. If they are not strained, then the outcome or the future of your finances is somewhat in limbo, depending on what the situation is going to be with living in limbo, depending on what the situation is going to be with living situation is going to be with child support, et cetera. And so what that has led to is the real need for us to be able to provide some other ways to give coaching and some of the other services to guys that are really in a difficult place and experiencing some hardships. So we have created the Foundation for Fathers, and the Divorced Advocates Foundation for Fathers is a nonprofit focused on community education and advocacy, and our mission is to provide free or low-cost resources, such as support groups, workshops, legal education and fatherhood programs aimed at helping all dads navigate divorce and custody challenges, especially those without access to professional services.
Speaker 1:So today I'm announcing we have just formed the Divorced Advocates Foundation for Fathers and, on that note, we've got a very special gentleman that's joining us today, that is partnering with us to help to fund this foundation as well, and his name is Will Black. And Will Black is the founder of Sharing the Credits. He is a leader in the merchant services industry and he's pioneered a very, very unique way to turn credit card processing fees into sustainable funding for charities, and we're going to talk in detail about how this works through this podcast, and then also how you will be able to, through no cost of your own, be able to help us to fund this foundation as well. Through Will's work, he's helped direct millions of dollars to nonprofits, earning recognition from organizations like Rotary International. Will's passion is making philanthropy easy and impactful for businesses and communities alike. Welcome, will.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:Thanks for having me Jude.
Speaker 1:My friend, I'm so excited to obviously so excited to be launching the foundation and getting rolling, but I'm extraordinarily excited to be partnering with sharing the credits in helping to fund this. And, as you and I were talking and some of the listeners know that I've got a background in finance and in banking, so I know just enough to be dangerous about stuff like merchant services and business, but I know more from the Really honestly Will. I know more from the standpoint of being a business owner myself for most of the last two decades, right, and having been taking credit cards and dealing with merchant service companies around that. So now, on the flip side of this and running into you, this is just an unbelievable way to help nonprofits have a sustainable resource for what they're doing. So I wanted to first I want to just give a brief synapse I shared this with you before of what this program looks like and how we are able to participate in this, and then I want to dive deep into how you got into this.
Speaker 1:So, sharing the credit's a program that enables businesses to support charities by redirecting a portion of their credit and debit card merchant fees Fees. Now, these fees would otherwise be paid to banks, so instead of it being paid to banks, it gets directed to a charity of their choice, and the program is promoted as a way for businesses to support causes without incurring extra costs. So these are the fees. These are not the processing fees. These are the fees that would otherwise go to the banks, and so you're able to redirect some of these back to a charity, and then the charity benefits from ongoing sustainable funding as long as that business is still operating and taking credit cards. Is that a good brief synapse of what sharing the credit is?
Speaker 2:That's it. I mean, as you kind of summed up, you learn more from running a business when you're in the industry. Right, Because that's the school of hard knocks, because, as a business man, taking plastic is the definition of the necessary evil, isn't it? I mean nobody's happy. Talk about the devil in the numbers. Nobody's happy with that one. They're just like how bad am I getting it? And we're like, if you're in business that means you take plastic, you pay that fee part of it can go to the thing I love, right, yeah.
Speaker 2:Or it can go to a banker. Buy him a new Lexus. You don't want to build a symphony, you want to save a puppy, feed the homeless, help a dad who had no intention of getting a divorce and he doesn't have all the wherewithal that some other people do, and this is compounding the worst day of his life. Well as we say, let your business do your talking, do your giving for you. Let it automate your philanthropy. You don't write the check. Let Visa MasterCard write the check, over and over and over.
Speaker 1:Right, so share with me a little bit about how you came up with this idea.
Speaker 2:Okay, so forgive me if I need to be slightly self-deprecating for a second. I have had some people go oh, this is so brilliant.
Speaker 2:Oh no, I'm the definition that God loves a fool, I am that fool, but no, no, loves a fool, I am that fool, but no, no.
Speaker 2:Back in my salad days years ago and I met, I was doing everything I can to get out there, build a network, right, yada, yada. And I was at a business networking lunch and I think it was my 3000th one that year, right, and there was a symphony executive director at it, and boy did he have a tale of woe because his entire board, they had destroyed their entire giving pool. And, jude, I don't mean a partial destruction, right. And Jude, I don't mean a partial destruction, right, I mean the area he was in had a lot of money, had a lot of old money, and all of a sudden he found out there was something worse than no, it was nobody's home, right, they just completely ghosted him, people that donated in debt for decades and he had no way to do it. And that's when I'm sitting there listening to him and God put a mental railroad spike in the middle of my brain. This was not an idea, this was a direct email from God right into the middle of my cortex, a download right on you.
Speaker 2:It hurt. I mean, I had that shock, that eureka moment. I think I was vibrating in my chair and I basically said I had to wait till the end of the speech. I don't know if I heard anything else he said. And I walked up and I said I need to buy you some lunch or something. He's like buddy, we were just that lunch. I said a bagel coffee, something. But we walked over and we got a cup of coffee and I said you have a donor base. They're just scared, right, they've burnt their fingers. They're gun shy, right, and they might can give to you. They just they can't give you any cash. It can't come out of pocket. And he's going oh brother, amen, right, like I'm feeding back his entire tale of woe. And I said I need to tell you something about businesses when they take credit cards and debit cards. Right, that's got a merchant account, right, your payment solution, that place we just bought the coffee from, I gave my debit card. At the end of the month, the system is going to take their fee out and he goes yeah, yeah, I said part of that fee goes back, but it's not going to Visa or Maskard or Discover.
Speaker 2:It's going back into the system, normally to a bank. This one part of that fee, part of it, right. I said, but why can't it go a 501c3, a nonprofit? I said because at the end of the day, buddy, it's a referral fee. I said only banks get it because only banks know about it. I know I've already got two or three banks. I pay these banks these fees, right. And he said okay. And I said you need to be the bank. And I will never forget the next line he said. He said that sounds good, but I think I lost three IQ points trying to figure it out. And I said it's a referral fee. We give it to the bank because businesses go into a bank by the way, that's where most people go to get a merchant account and they're not going to hand that off to Visa MassCard without a percentage. So Visa MassCard's built this fee in.
Speaker 1:Why can't?
Speaker 2:I give it to a nonprofit if the nonprofit refers the business, right. So in, in, in, inside of the next two months he would refer me to a bunch of people, the first one we ever talked to. The third business we talked to, but the first one to sign up was a bunch of people, the first one we ever talked to. The third business we talked to, but the first one to sign up was a car dealership. They were doing, Jude, a million dollars a month in plastic, just debit and credit cards. And that's not selling cars. Nobody's buying Nissans and trucks, right On their debit card and credit card. That's oil changes, bumpers, right, you know, extended warranty.
Speaker 2:And we said to to them. We already had the numbers. We're like you're overpaying thirty thousand dollars a year in fees. And they're like that's wow, that's a car. Right, it's a whole car, it's an employee. I said right, I said if you make a switch, well, you'll save that thirty thousand, you'll keep it your pocket, but you'll donate the built-in number to your charity, right. And they said you have our, you know, and there's a piece of paperwork that protects you. It says we can only give to your charity. We can't change our mind. And he said that's what we were waiting on. You have our business and they would donate a little under $100,000 a year. Yeah, yeah, 16 years later, that group, as all of our businesses, they're still with us today. They're doing a little under $2 million a month.
Speaker 1:Their struggle continues, right Keep those guys in your thoughts and prayers. That's tremendous.
Speaker 2:And they're giving an excess of $160,000 a year to their charity.
Speaker 1:They just shovel it in One business to their charity, gives $160,000 a year.
Speaker 2:Over and over and over.
Speaker 1:Over and over every single year. That is tremendous. So I just want to clarify for those that aren't so, those that are in business that are listening, those dads that have a business that are listening and do understand how this might understand how this works, but those that don't might not so. At Visa, mastercard, discover, american Express, they all charge a percentage in order for the use of a debit or credit card, right, so that is the fee that is charged to the business, and that is just a fee that they get paid just for the convenience of being able to do that. Now, what you described, though, and how you're able to help the charities, that's not the fee and that's not negotiable, except that you are oftentimes, with a high, high percentage, like 99.59, whatever percentage, it is right. What was it? 98.5 or something like that, I think you said of the time able to even find better rates for each of the businesses on that, because you have such a large pool of providers that can provide that. Right. That's where you found that $30,000 savings for that correct.
Speaker 1:Right right, okay, so I want to just clarify how that works. That's where you were able to find savings for that particular business because you were able to find a lower rate there. So business right there is taking the credit cards and less, which some states. You start to have the surcharge pricing Some areas here. Some businesses are starting to pass that on to consumers in different creative ways, et cetera. So if you can lower that fee, that's awesome to the business. Now, the other part that you just described and talked about was the fee, the referral fee. So all the banks, all the major banks, have a company that they refer to. That's how they have their businesses customers come in. If you're a business owner, you've ever been to a bank they're always going to talk to you about merchant services, credit cards, et cetera. So that's the fee that they get and that's where you come in is you are able to redirect those fees to a nonprofit of their choice, which in this case, is the Foundation for Fathers, correct?
Speaker 2:Amen, right. So they don't realize that you know if you've got Joe's Pizza Shop, right. So everybody comes in, buys a slice and a Coke, buys a pizza and a beer, takes a couple of pies home to the family, right? Or to their game night, whatever they're doing, game night, whatever they're doing. Every time somebody comes in with their debit card, credit card, they know at the end of the month it feels like those guys are coming in and eating their lunch. They jokingly, I say they take their pound of flesh out.
Speaker 2:and this is when my business owners speak up and they're like you mean two and a half pounds of flesh, three pounds of flesh, and I'm like right, but every time they do that isn't going along to the Visa mask card, you know it just going into the system and it could, and it could go to something that they love. So, without writing a check, and that's really the coolest thing about it. If you think about it like a gym right, you know, gym is the definition of you, set it and forget it. You signed up three years ago, you went twice, you're still paying a monthly, you know $19.99, $29.99. Right, this is.
Speaker 2:I signed this up and my business then has been giving and they've been giving for years and it's just on automatic. So when they get their thank yous and then their end of year piece from their charity, they see the impact, but they're like I'm not writing the check. Their charity they see the impact, but they're like I'm not writing the check. And if you want to talk about double dipping somebody in terms of feeling good, that's it. You keep getting thank you notes. You thank you for the gift, you know, but I'm not even writing the check. I'm just open for business.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So what we would like to ask the dads that are listening today is that in, in, we can up, we operate in north america, right canada or the united states, or mexico too, do you do us in canada right now us in canada right now.
Speaker 1:Okay, because we do have a, a listenership that is across the world australia, uk, some other places to have a. We have a lot of listeners. Unfortunately, we can't do it there right now, but if you know of a business that takes credit cards, we would love for you to get us in contact with them so that we can schedule a time to talk with them about how they can, one, save money providing credit cards and taking credit cards and, two, support the Foundation for Fathers. How and why is this going to help any of the dads? Listening is because what the Foundation for Fathers is doing is offsetting coaching fees, providing free memberships to the Divorced Advocate community, providing scholarships and doing other things to help augment the divorced advocate community in partnership with the divorced advocate. So those fees would go directly to the foundation to help with that, which, in turn, is going to help each of these dads, whether you're part of the community looking for coaching, want to get involved with one of our workshops, et cetera. We'll also be able to work with some other nonprofits and providing more of that as well.
Speaker 1:So if you know a business, it could be any business that takes credit card. It's simple as saying, hey, would you like to help a charity that is dear to my heart and save some money? It's as simple as that. And then connect them with me at jude, at thedivorcedadvocatecom, and we'll put like a little link in the show notes as well. So I just wanted to put that plug in there, will, because in guys listening in the future you're going to be hearing a mid-roll just PSA on this each and every show going forward. Just to remind you to do that. Because it's a very easy way. If you're out to lunch or you're doing something, every time you pull out your credit card you could be like, oh, foundation for fathers, let me get a contact information and send it off to Jude so that I can get in contact with them. I can't tell you, guys, if we just do this with 20 businesses, this is going to fund everything for the divorce advocate for an entire year. So so we'll let's talk.
Speaker 2:That's so responsible. I got to say that is such a responsible thing to do, man. I love that because, as you and I have talked about before, you get into a divorce that you never intended anyway. Some of them sometimes never saw it coming right.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, that's not always in the most financial best time of your life, and even if it is, it's expensive, right? It is like having two or three vampires around your neck. I love that you can do this and support these guys, cause that's what, that's what divorce advocates about in the first place, right?
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:It's. I don't want you to have to go through it, but if you are going through it, you know I don't want the plane to blow up, but I want you to know how to use a parachute Well. You know your marriage to go sell, but if you do, this is a resource for you. I love the idea of the foundation for fathers.
Speaker 1:Well and hey Will like attorneys. So every one of us most every one of us going through this, has to hire an attorney, and so if you are working with an attorney and you're paying them a retainer, when you pay that retainer, get me in contact with them because we can save them money on the fees. But we can also then work with them If they are part of our foundation, if they are giving to our foundation. I already have a program that I work with attorneys where we will be giving them free, yearly membership to the community, so this will benefit you. It's also going to pay it forward to other dads that are going to be coming along after you going through this as well. So when you're making that deposit or you're making monthly payments, or you're paying an attorney, when you're putting that card in, make a connection. Make a connection with me and let me reach out to them and talk with them.
Speaker 1:So I wanted to that just came to my, that just came to my mind, will, while we're talking about that and let's, so let's just talk about, let's talk about then you the one, well, there's. So we talked about the benefits of the businesses, the attorneys or whoever. Let's talk about the benefits to the foundation, and so for me and you touched on this a little bit before the long-term donor retention part of this because we were talking just before offline, with funding from different nonprofits and different ways and the grant programs that they have to look for and this and that, and part of the hard thing around that and when I was setting this up and thinking like, well, how am I going to actually find money to do? I don't want to be a grant writer and I don't want to have to find monthly done, like all that, and that's why I was so excited about this the long-term donor retention thing is so, so huge. Do you have any numbers around how long the businesses stay with a merchant provider? That then is funding the nonprofit.
Speaker 2:I do Thank you for giving me the layup so I can dunk a little brag on my way a little brag on yeah, baby, well, no.
Speaker 2:So the first thing I'm gonna I'm gonna say is again that first client. We signed up 16 years ago, right, and they were a million dollar a month. Business, that's not your average. You know little. You know pizza shop, right, um, and I love a pizza. That's not me talking bad about pizza, I'm a pizza man. But that's a pretty girl at the ball and everybody wants to dance with her. And they are courted by any number of banks every quarter, as they tell me all the time.
Speaker 2:And 16 years later, they're still with us. Right, we have lost less than it's easier to count what we've lost. We've lost less than one half of 1% of all clients we've ever signed since inception. And that's how many years ago? 16. 16. Okay, right, and there's a reason for that. It's not because I'm so, so pretty and I am. My mama told me I am right, I don't think she'd lie to me. But no, no, it's because, at the end of the day, if your business is saving puppies, if your business is helping a veteran, if your business is giving to Foundation for Fathers because you know what that kind of pain is like, right, and you're not writing a check for it, then I have a wonderful.
Speaker 2:I used to say I've got a bass hook of guilt in your lip. No, no, I've. I've put a, I put a halo around you that I shackle you to me. And and this is what our businesses tell us, they say they have a three-step process. They said, as long as you keep my number low, right, that's important, it's not mercenary. Say, well, it's got to be good for me, right, you keep my number low, you give to the thing I love. I will never leave and we hear that over and over and over from million dollar month businesses to people that opened six months ago. And you know, and we were their first foray, you knoway out into the payment solution world Right, but it's because, as one entrepreneur said to me years ago, they said my business isn't did we lose you there?
Speaker 1:okay, well, I think we lost you because you cut off mid-sentence there. So, oh, that sounds like you're back am I here, you there? Yeah, yeah, yeah, you cut off mid-sentence there, so weird that that mike did that.
Speaker 2:He did that in the pre you know the pre start thing.
Speaker 2:But, as I was, as I was saying, I was told by an entrepreneur years and years ago.
Speaker 2:They said my business isn't the only thing that inspires me, right, and this was a person that put in 10, 12, you know 13 hour days and, uh, and I said, because I was introduced to them by their charity, they're like this is the charity that on Christmas Eve, if I'm not thinking about songs and eggnog and my children or whatever, I think about this one, right, well, my deathbed, I'm going to be saying to my family keep supporting these guys. Right, these are the ones doing the good in the world and I love that. Right, that was a really you know scales falling from your eyes moment. But if you keep their number low and you give to their thing, why wouldn't they go? My thing that I really like is is I tell people all the time and this is only from a thousand data points, right, I'm like a person will give you 10, 20, 50, 100 bucks. A business might give you 50, 100, 1,000, $5,000 a month, month after month, year after year, and that's when it gets pretty interesting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that's tremendous. So let's wrap up. I just want to review the aspects and the highlights of how each of this works. So, again, we just talked about the charitable impact is ongoing. It's funding that's ongoing. It's sustainable.
Speaker 1:It's easy for nonprofits to participate. I don't have to do anything, I'm set up with Will. Once the business gets set up, it literally gets deposited into the Foundation for Fathers account the businesses there's no extra costs. So if you are a business owner, get in contact with me. If you know a business, get in contact with me. They can save on their fees like 98.5% chance that that's going to happen and it's a positive impact, Like we were talking about. It just feels good, Right, it just feels good. It's not even, it's not even a hook of of of guilt, Like you said. It feels good. And when and as a business owner, right, when we're doing good and we're making money, we do want to give back.
Speaker 1:This is an easy way. You don't have to write the check, Right? You don't have to. You don't have to sponsor a golf event like any, any of the traditional stuff. It just happens automatically by you doing the same business that you're doing.
Speaker 1:And then there's the, the, the retention rate that you talked about. User satisfaction, unless you know, as long as you keep that number low, that's great. And then the unique value is that you're redirecting these fees that would otherwise go to banks, and you know banks are a necessary evil, the fees are a necessary evil. The percentage of the using is all a necessary evil. You're able to do some good and it's a unique value that you provide and it is completely, 100% effortless to do this so well. Man, this was really terrific. How much I appreciate what you have created here, because it is so many times in business you don't see people that are looking at things from an outside perspective to change, and the word these days is disruptors right, Disruptors and this isn't necessarily disruptive, but it is disruptive in a good way because, man, the impact that this is going to have, such an impact across the world on so many dads and their families.
Speaker 1:So I just wanted to just express my appreciation for you creating this and for you partnering with the Foundation for Brothers, and it looks like we lost Will again. So I'm going to end it on that and if you have an interest in helping out with this, please contact me directly at judeatthedivorcedadvocatecom. We're going to put a link in the show notes below for you to look at too. Also, if you know any nonprofits that could benefit from this and working with Will, the website is sharingthecreditcom. You can go there directly or, again, you can contact me. It helps us out as well if I'm able to refer anybody else to.
Speaker 1:So it kind of continues to scale for us. So you can contact me. You can go directly to sharingthecreditcom as well. You can contact me. You can go directly to sharingthecreditcom as well. And again, as always, if you found some value in this, please share far and wide. Give us a star rating, Leave us a comment on whatever podcast platform or whatever platform you're watching or listening to this on. Thank you so much for listening. Will Black, thank you for being here this week and God bless.
