Gloria Jetter Crockett has more than 25 years of management and leadership experience at both a local and national level within the nonprofit arena. Currently, she is the President and CEO of Make-A-Wish® Orange County and the Inland Empire, an organization that grants wishes to children battling critical illnesses.
She has gained extensive experience in working with community and corporate leaders, volunteers, major gift donors and leading high-performance teams of staff and volunteers. Previously, she was the chief development officer for Second Harvest Food Bank of Orange County and formerly served as the interim executive director for development and the senior director of development for the cancer programs for the University of California, Irvine School of Medicine. In this role, Crockett lead a team of seven and was responsible for $10 million in fundraising annually.
Prior to the University of California, Irvine, Crockett spent 17 years in advanced roles with the American Cancer Society culminating in the state senior vice president for Maryland, managing a team of 45 and raising over $7 million dollars annually. In this role, she led the Society’s community and volunteerism efforts and guided staff and volunteers daily in support of the Society’s goals and mission. Crockett was successful in providing strategic leadership and direction, which advanced a diverse portfolio of bottom line objectives. Crockett holds a bachelor’s degree in public relations from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, and currently resides in Orange County with her family.
Episode:
Narrator  This is The Norris Group’s real estate investor radio show the award-winning show dedicated to thought leaders shaping the real estate industry and local experts revealing their insider tips to succeed in an ever -changing real estate market hosted by author, investor, and hard money lender, Bruce Norris
Joey Romero  Hi and welcome to The Norris Group, real estate radio show and podcast. Before I get to our guest bio, I want to thank our Platinum sponsors for I Survived Real Estate which is going to be on October 27 and yes, there’s still tickets available. We would love to thank Dan Redid and SDCIA, Kaaren Hall at uDirectIRA ServicesBuddy and Kimberly Rushing with White Feather Investments, MVT Pro, Rich Rice and the Inland Empire Real Estate Investment Club. Tom Wilson and Wilson investment Properties and lastly Platinum Sponsor Realty411. Today our guest is Gloria Crockett. Gloria has more than 25 years of management and leadership experience at both local and national level within the nonprofit arena. Currently, she is the president and CEO of Make-A-Wish Orange County and the Inland Empire, an organization that grants wishes children battling critical illnesses. Glorie has gained extensive experience in working with community and corporate leaders and volunteers, major gift donors and leading high performance teams of staff and volunteers. Previously, she was the Chief Development Officer for Second Harvest FoodBank of Orange County, and formally served as the Interim Executive Director for Development and the Senior Director of Development for the cancer programs for the University of California, Irvine School of Medicine. In this role, she led a team of seven and was responsible for 10 million in fundraising. Prior to the University of California Irvine, she spent 17 years in advanced roles within the American Cancer Society, culminating in the state Senior Vice President for Maryland, managing a team of 45 and raising over $7 million annually. In this role, she led the society’s community and volunteerism efforts and guided staff and volunteers daily in support of the society’s missions and goals. She was successful in providing strategic leadership and direction which advance a diverse portfolio of bottom line objectives. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Public Relations from Cal Poly Pomona, and currently resides in Orange County with her family. Gloria, it’s great to have you back on the show.
Gloria Crockett Oh, thank you, Joey. It’s lovely to be here with you all.
Joey Romero  So, you know, last year I was just mentioning to Gloria at last year, we you know, we did a very big show, you know, it was it was a two parter. I kind of want to do just an update in advance to I Survived Real Estate here coming up in a couple of weeks. Can you believe it’s, it’s almost here? So, for those that maybe are new, or you know, maybe didn’t catch the show last year, can you just tell us a little bit about Make-A-Wish, overall and your chapter?
Gloria Crockett  Yes, so our chapter is chapter 007, which is Make-A-Wish Orange County and the Inland Empire. So servicing Orange, Riverside, and San Bernardino counties. And make a wish is an organization that really inspires kids and their families and provides hope. Our mission is to provide a wish to kids that are battling a critical illness. And so that can be a variety of different diagnosis. But what’s most important is there are five types of wishes that can be offered between for kids between the ages of two and a half and 18. The types of wishes are, I wish to have, I wish to be I wish to give, I wish to meet I wish to go. So if you can imagine that. Some of them are going to Disneyland. Some of them are being a zookeeper. Some of them are giving back to the homeless. And some of them are, you know, meeting Patrick Mahomes. For example, one of our kids wish for that. So it’s really, really what that child is wishing for. And we tried to make it happen.
Joey Romero  I did see that. I was cruising the website in preparation. And the one that stood out to me was the the wish to give, you know, the the one that wanted to give back to you know, he gave toys to the pediatric center that he was at and you know, set him off, you know, after he was I forget his name of top my head.
Gloria Crockett  Matthew.
Joey Romero  Matthew, yes. After he was done with his treatment, he left with such a great feeling that, you know, he remembered all of the tough and the painful times that he was there. So he wanted to give back to the kids going through what he had to go through to give them hope. And I thought that was special. I kind of felt like that was something that Aaron would do.
Gloria Crockett  Yes, for sure. 100%
Joey Romero  So, you know, one of the bad raps that nonprofits get you know, across the country is that not all the money gets spent where it’s supposed to go? I do have some of your stats, you know, 73% of your program, your funds get spent on actual programming, 11% on management, and 60%, back into fundraising. How is it that you guys get? How do you guys raise money? And where do you come from grants? Is that all donations? Can you tell us about how Make-A-Wish gets his gets the money?
Gloria Crockett  Well, I want to update you, because those are pre pandemic numbers, I want to make sure you know that. So we actually, I want to share that through the pandemic we granted wishes to as many wish kids as we possibly could, as long as it didn’t include large gatherings or air travel. A year ago, we started with that air travel in large gatherings, and, you know, what we’d have right now is a pipeline of wishes that are waiting, we have 580 wishes that are waiting. During the pandemic, we got down to 55% program ratio. Last year, we finished the year out at 67% program ratio. So we’re coming back. And I want to say that wishes are costing more, they used to cost $7,500. And now the average cost is 10,000. So that’s making a big difference. So what I will say is, even if our program ratio has gone down, it’s making its way back up. And that’s what’s important because we’re coming out of the pandemic. And I would like to share that Charity Navigator, we’ve got a gold star rating, GuideStar, we have a platinum, these are the highest ratings, you can have as a not for profit. And I want to share that this is a different time. And yes, sometimes nonprofits do you get a bad rap for that? And I think that what I would ask is to watch our nonprofits and see them grow and emerge from the pandemic, because it’s a very different world for not for profits. And it’s a difficult one. And we have to take one step at a time. And all I want to say is the bottom line is we’re providing as much hope as possible. And we’re trying to keep ourselves as lean as possible. And what I think people need to think about that we have to invest in ourselves to be able to continue to grow, because we’ve got 580 kids that are waiting for wish and we got to make it happen. We got to make it happen now.
Joey Romero  Yeah, and absolutely. And this wasn’t to throw shade on nonprofits overall because if you know anything about us in the Norris group, we have a huge philanthropy, philanthropy heart. But, you know, some sometimes people are hesitant to give because all I heard only 10% actually gets used for, you know what it’s supposed to, you know, so what I wanted to do is highlighted that it’s nowhere near that, especially for you guys, and you guys have those great ratings. And that’s why you guys are a terrific charity to work with.
Gloria Crockett  No, no. And please know that Norris Group is an amazing partner. And I know you guys are our champions.
Joey Romero  So one of the things, do you have how many wishes you guys granted last year in 2022?
Gloria Crockett  So we actually just close our fiscal year 23 At the end of August, and I’m happy to share that this is an audited numbers, but that we granted 240 Amazing wishes.
Joey Romero  Wow, that is unbelievable. That’s so cool. How do people get to be on the wish radar? Or how do the wishes come to you.
Gloria Crockett  So how they come? Anybody can refer a wish to us. So you just go on our website, and you click through and you do the referral form. It can be a parent, it can be a social worker, it can be a friend of the family, you fill out the paperwork, and then it goes through a process through Make-A-Wish America which is our national office, and they go through a qualification. And they come back to us and they say okay, they’re qualified and we start with a wish journey, which is really where we have wish granters meet with the wish child to determine their true heartfelt wish. And then we start to build the wish from there.
Joey Romero  Is just as John Cena is still the biggest wish granter?
Gloria Crockett  Yes he is.
Joey Romero  That’s so amazing to see that this you know, like, I’m not, I you know, I don’t follow the you know, WWE or wrestling or anything like that. But I just shows goes to show like how big you know, wrestling was, you know, when I was a kid sure, you know, Hulk Hogan and all that kind of stuff. But it’s funny to me that and he’s prolific. It’s not even close, right?
Gloria Crockett  No, no, he’s definitely the lead and you know that I think the thing about it is everyone thinks like, oh my gosh, you know, this guy that’s a wrestler and you know, he’s just got such a big heart.
Joey Romero  What’s the biggest celebrity that your chapter has worked with?
Gloria Crockett  Oh, gosh, you stumped me on that. I would say this. In our area, the biggest places are the most sought out oftentimes are the angels, the decks. And then of course we’ve got here we’ve got Blizzard Entertainment. So we have a lot of requests for that. And of course, as you can imagine, we have Disneyland.
Joey Romero  Yes.
Gloria Crockett  So we have a lot of wishes for Disneyland’s.
Joey Romero  Have you ever got a wish that was just too big? And what happens when you can’t actually grant the wish?
Gloria Crockett  Well, that’s a really great question. So there are some wishes that we aren’t able to grant. We can’t do things like, you know, let’s say some child wanted a mini house, a small house, or a horse. We have to think about when a child wants a horse, does the family have a car that can actually pull a horse trailer? Do they have a horse trailer? Do they have a place to keep the horse? There’s all these other factors that maybe when you’re thinking about I want a horse don’t come to mind? And so we have to kind of peel back different layers to find out like, is this something really the entire family could manage? And so we always try to figure out two wishes that the child is really just over the top excited about and then determine with the family. What’s that best next step?
Joey Romero  That’s, it’s kind of like you don’t give somebody a puppy for Christmas, right?
Gloria Crockett  Yeah, exactly.
Joey Romero  Oh, my, you know, I stumbled across they’re making a move out of wish? at a bigger wish.
Gloria Crockett  Actually…
Joey Romero  Can you talk about wish the movie? it’s literally like, so the story centers around a king who grants wishes. But, you know, his apprentice, you know, finds out that, you know, he’s only granting certain wishes, the ones that he likes. And she’s like, No, we gotta grant more wishes. So she wishes upon a star. And the star becomes a little ally, and she starts granting all these wishes.
Gloria Crockett  I know, they have new merchandise Disney does, and they oftentimes do. And that’s pretty exciting.
Joey Romero  I thought it was cool. I was like, oh my god, Disney made a movie out of wish.
Gloria Crockett  The film release is November 22.
Joey Romero  Okay, there you go.
Gloria Crockett  Though, the wish partnership with Disney is amazing. Because each year they do wish merchandise that they help with. And what they’re looking to do is to help raise funds for Make-A-Wish through the product collection, and help us grant more wishes. So we’re really excited about that.
Joey Romero  So when when there’s a national campaign, you know, when national gets like, you know, huge money, how does that trickle down to the small chapters?
Gloria Crockett  So what we do is we have national campaigns, and oftentimes they’re with companies. Either merchandisers or let’s say, the NFL different things like that. What we’ll do is where the funds are raised, based on Chapter territory, they’ll distribute the funds, most often times in that type of arrangement.
Joey Romero  So like if the Angels and the Ducks do something, you guys, that money go to you guys?
Gloria Crockett  Yes. If nationality develops the partnership.
Joey Romero  Perfect. One of the things I was looking at the in the National Board of Directors, you guys have some heavy hitters on the board. And it’s Nike, it’s, you know, a president of a major league baseball team, which I won’t mention, because they just beat my Dodgers. The WWE Disney Parks boomba my absolute favorite and how do we not get on board with this is the CEO of Nothing Bundt Cakes is on the national board?
Gloria Crockett  Yes. Is that awesome?
Joey Romero  We need to get Nothing Bundt Cakes everywhere. Everyone loves those. So one of the things that I did notice is everybody that works for Make-A-Wish has like a my wish. And yours was to be an archaeologist. Can you tell us why? Why an archaeologist? Did you miss your calling?
Gloria Crockett  Well, when I was a little girl and even a teenager, it was all about identifying different type of rock formations and rocks and understanding those and so I would make up these little digs that I was trying to figure out. And, you know, I think that history aspect of it was just so amazing that I was like, I’m just gonna be this outdoor person that you know, an archaeologist and just get it done. And I was like, I don’t know, something hit me in college. I changed my mind.
Joey Romero  But yeah, my son was forever. You know, he loved dinosaurs, and he wanted to be an archaeologist for a long time. And then he graduated high school and he’s like, I want to fly.
Gloria Crockett  Yeah.
Joey Romero  So he’s a pilot now. So that’s, that’s, okay. As long as you find something.
Gloria Crockett  Yes.
Joey Romero  You know. So, like, for me, you know, like, and you can’t do the whole I wish for ten more wishes. You know, I think for me, like, like, my wish would be, that my kids just live long, meaningful life. And, you know, I’ve worked hard to try to set the example, you know, I’ve donated my time, one of the reasons I ended up at The Norris Group was all the time I spent volunteering with Aaron, you know, and it was all over the Inland Empire, we just did a ton of stuff together. And that’s how, and he’s like, Hey, you want to come work for us, you know, me and dad want to make you an offer. But, you know, that’s one of the things that I wanted to do, because I’m not gonna say it’s easy. And maybe I’ve mentioned this before, but you know, a lot of people join causes or make it their life mission, after a tragedy, after losing somebody close to them, I wanted my kids to see their dad give back, because it’s the right thing to do. And so, in their younger years, I did, you know, give a lot of time, and it was, you know, 10 years that I spent in the Inland Empire, you know, all the way from Habitat for Humanity to finishing my, my stint as the president of the Riverside Area Rape Crisis Center. So I gave back to a lot of boards, committees and things like that. And I think it’s important for people to do that. Because the relationships that you build with people around you, and in the fact that you’re actually doing good, you know, and what I would say is, if you are going to participate, you know, don’t stand on the sidelines, don’t just, you know, join a board so that you can say, hey, look, I’m on that board, you know, get in there make an impact, and get involved. You know, can you speak to when you have a great board? It really, truly does. Because it’s people think, Oh, well, the board runs everything. Oh, no, no, the staff runs it. No, it’s when an organization is truly, truly doing what they’re supposed to do an impact in the community, it’s when the board and the staff are working together cohesively to fulfill the mission of the of the nonprofit.
Gloria Crockett  Exactly, no, we have an amazing board. And how it works is, you know, really, the staff is the operation side of the house. And the board has their own goals as well. So for us, for example, we have a strategic plan that was built with the staff and the board, but the board has goals are and the board has goals, and we have goals. And so we each set, set the pace of having, okay, we have a variety of committees, that are board committees, that have certain KPIs and measurables, that they are responsible for completing, and then the operation side of the house has certain KPIs that we are measured on as well. And I think the for a board, you know, their elevator speech has to always be ready talking about what they do. So we have to make sure that they’re engaged in wishes, they can tell a wish story, they’re immersed in what we do every single day. And I have to say that our board has given them this past fiscal year $831,000 in support of their give, get for our chapter, and that’s amazing.
Joey Romero 18:14It is, it is amazing, because that’s the one thing you know, especially, you know, when I was serving, I was younger, you know, so you don’t you don’t have the funds to give. So, you know, Aaron’s you know, time talent or treasure, you’re gonna get one of those. So that’s, that’s really cool. So, you know, with Bruce retiring, next year, we’re going to have new management, and it does look like this will be our final I Survived Real Estate. I know, I’ve heard from a lot of partners, and a lot of folks that have gone to this over the years that are asking, Hey, well, how can we, you know, keep this going, you know? So this could be we are, you know, as it as it is been? Over the years, this will be the last one but, you know, never say never, you know, Bruce has been known to say, Hey, this is my final seminar. And then the next year, we’re doing another seminar. So it’s not, it’s not you know, it’s probably 95% that we’re, this will be the last one. So, we’re going to try and make it as special as we can. We just want to thank you for everything that you guys do for being a tremendous partner every time we need anything or, you know, I call you last minutes. You guys are always so minimal. So it’s been great to work with you guys. It’s been you know, Aaron’s dream come true. This was his event that he created in his legacy. I do appreciate you, you know, coming along for the ride.
Gloria Crockett  Well, it has been our true honor and to be honest, but truly grateful for the partnership. You guys have granted so many amazing wishes and the legacy is going to continue for years and years to come and you know, I have to say when I attend the events that I’m amazed by the information that I can somewhat comprehend, because it’s some of it’s over my head, but I tell you, person is a industry leader. And what you guys have done for Make-A-Wish will go on for in perpetuity because the relationship is so strong. It’s a partnership like knowing none other. And I want to just say we appreciate you guys. And like you said, Aaron’s legacy continues to live on and we just appreciate you so much.
Joey Romero  I really appreciate you being on Gloria. Thank you.
Gloria Crockett  Thank you Joey, you have a lovely afternoon.
Joey Romero  The Norris group also like to thank our Gold Sponsors for I Survived Real Estate on October 27 Brent Lee and Windermere Tower Properties, The Outspoken Investor Tony Alvarez, Sean O’Toole and PropertyRadar, Fair Trade Real Estate, Matt MacFarland and Amanda Han over at KeystoneCPA, Derek Harms and NSDREI, David Granzella and NorCal REIA, White House Catering, Mark Dalling and the Inland Valley Association of Realtors-IVAR, Christina Suter and Pasadena FIBI. And last but not least, Susue Leivas and Leivas Wealth Management. A special shout out goes to Rick and Leanne Rossiter for providing the dinner wine. Thank you so much.
Narrator  For more information on hard money, loans and upcoming events with The Norris Group, check out thenorrisgroup.com. For information on passive investing with trust deeds, visit tngtrustdeeds.com.
Aaron Norris  The Norris Group originates and services loans in California and Florida under California DRE License 01219911, Florida Mortgage Lender License 1577, and NMLS License 1623669. For more information on hard money lending, go www.thenorrisgroup.com and click the Hard Money tab.