The Frey Foundation invests in and partners with organizations in west and northern Michigan. It focuses on four pillars: Building community, children and families, community arts and the environment. The foundation’s current chair, Tripp Frey, spoke with Crain Currency about its work and how family foundations have evolved.
The Frey Foundation is a place-based funder. Can you talk about the foundation’s four pillars?
The four grantmaking pillars at the Frey Foundation are really secondary to the fact that we’re a place-based funder, and we’re attempting to drive systemic change. The pillars provide an easy way to organize our grantmaking and allow new grant seekers to see the broad areas that we cover.
In reality, the four pillars cover most topics. Our primary focus is on developing meaningful relationships with our grantee partners so we can deeply understand their needs and help them in any way we can. Obviously, that’s often and primarily through grants. But we also provide connections, capacity building and other resources to give them the best chance of reaching their goals.
Can you share some examples of initiatives the foundation has worked on across those four pillars?
We award more than 100 grants each year across all the program areas, and many examples can be found on our website. But a few that stand out to me are, one: Grand Rapids Whitewater. This project involves improving the Grand River by removing dams, which in turn will enhance water quality, fish passage and recreational opportunities on the river. Moreover, the GRWW movement has inspired other organizations to make the river a priority and a focus. Thus, this is more than an environmental project but a project that checks the building-community pillar, too.
Two, we recently awarded a grant to the YMCA, which is opening a new child care center at the primary hub of the Rapid, our bus system in downtown Grand Rapids. This is a really innovative solution for the problem of not enough child care slots, especially ones that are affordable. It will be very convenient — or sometimes the only feasible option — for parents who use the bus system. This certainly hits the children-and-families bucket.
How does the foundation build partnerships with its grantees?
Building partnerships is a key aspect of our work, and we do our best to approach all work with “trust-based philanthropy.” We’re not just check writers. Frey Foundation staff meet with potential grantees to understand their organizations. We do a lot of listening and, through conversations, attempt to arrive at the solutions that best help the organizations achieve their goals. That might be simply a check; but as noted above, it very well could be a variety of other value-added tools, some of which are as simple as making a new connection.
All of the foundation’s trustees are family members, and the third generation is currently at the helm: Can you share some insights into how the foundation has navigated those generational transitions?
I could spend a lot of time on this topic. Family organizations can be challenging, and the fact that all trustees are family members, as defined by our bylaws, potentially makes it even trickier. At a high level, the second generation made it a priority and had a plan. Was the plan perfect? No, but they spent time to develop and execute a plan to engage the third generation.
Some examples of the plan to bring along the third generation included the ability to sit in on board and investment committee meetings, learning sessions with our investment consultants and site visits to various grantee partners. When it came time, the actual transition to our generation has been pretty smooth. So, I think we need to credit the second generation for that.
Looking ahead, we recently developed a more detailed onboarding road map for future generations, because we have a wide span of ages in the fourth generation. My primary goal was to develop a plan that provided on-ramps for family members to engage at appropriate spots. We want to find out who is interested and to help those that are interested blossom into future leaders. We also encourage family members to gain experience on other boards and through their work and volunteer experiences.
How do you think family foundations have evolved since your grandparents started the Frey Foundation?
The world of philanthropy, including family foundations, has certainly become more sophisticated over the last 50 years. Essentially, they started as check-writing organizations but have evolved like many others into foundations that can deploy many tools. As noted above, some of these tools don’t involve money — such as making new connections or offering our office space to gather.
Other financial tools have emerged over the years as well, and they include program-related investments, loan guarantees, etc. Many foundations are taking a serious look at their endowment and are asking themselves how they can align their corpus with their mission.
What are some of the foundation’s initiatives you are most excited about in 2024?
2024 is the Frey Foundation’s 50th anniversary, and while there is no doubt we’ve done good work the past 50 years, I am beyond excited to see what the next 50 hold. It all starts in 2024, and it’s fitting that our grant pipeline is very full — so many great projects happening at this time.
One key area on which we are focused right now is housing. We’ve made an intentional effort to be out front on this topic and have been successful in lifting the visibility of this need among our community partners. We now have solid data regarding the community needs, and new and innovative solutions are popping up all the time. Housing is a need we all have, and we hope to drive real impact on this topic in the years to come.
How can impact investing help families build lasting legacies?
Impact investing is a bit of a nebulous term. It can mean many different things to many different people. In 2022, we embarked on an “impact investing” journey to understand what that means to us. It was a helpful process, and we got a few clear outcomes. But I’m not sure we have 100% clarity, even after all the time we spent.
Out of our journey, we gave ourselves some guardrails for both some mission-related investment opportunities in our endowment as well as program-related investments. At the end of the day, the foundation’s goal is to drive impact in the communities we serve. And we view our grants essentially as investments. So, hopefully, we’re doing impact investing every day.
The Frey Foundation is the family’s lasting legacy. There is no longer any significant Frey family enterprise, but we are all eternally grateful for the vision of our grandparents, that they saw how a foundation can continue to positively impact the communities they — and us now, too — love very much. We work to honor them and the other members of our family through this work.
A family’s most powerful asset? Its resilience narrative
By JAMIE YUENGER
In the past two decades, multi-generational families have been embracing a more holistic approach to wealth and business continuity. Their plans now take into account human capital — including leadership development, mental health and family governance. Nevertheless, one key asset is frequently unrecognized and underutilized: a family’s narrative.
A family’s narrative — its ever-growing compendium of tales — communicates overarching ideas and values about who the family is and, more important, who its members can be. The narrative tells family members how to approach life’s challenges and serves as connective tissue, either supporting or undermining aspects of their prosperity and well-being.
This article is a primer for bolstering family resilience by making good on something families already have: a unique collection of stories, ones they know well and others they’ve possibly hidden away. From the rigorous social research conducted by Emory University’s Robyn Fivush, we now know the three interlocking elements of strong, empowering family narratives — what I term here their “resilience narrative”: positive-meaning making, coherence and emotional truth.
Fivush’s research reveals that adolescents and young adults endowed with a rich repository of family narratives — articulated with positive-framing, authenticity and detail — exhibit elevated levels of self-esteem, reduced anxiety and a heightened sense of life's purpose and meaning. In essence, family storytelling significantly influences whether a person will cultivate resilience, grit and a sense of belonging.
But not all storytelling is equal, Fivush has emphasized:
“What is most important for family memories is how we tell them, how we frame them — when a challenging event occurs, did we rise to the occasion and come together as a family to cope or overcome, or were we devastated and could not recover? It is the interpretations and evaluations that provide the grist of family stories. It is not always about what happened — although that clearly matters — but what we think it means about who we are.”
Resilience in action
The Sugahara family became interested in a family film project during a significant business transition. The idea for a film was initially proposed by a member of their board of owners as a means of honoring the values and experiences of the family's departing leadership. Having spearheaded innovations in shipping, oil and transportation, the second-generation leaders paved the way for the rising generation. As the family's third generation stepped into ownership, they sought to document pivotal stories, convey their genuine gratitude and outline a compelling vision for the future.
Interestingly, the family recognized that their considerable business success stemmed from a traumatic period in the 1940s when their first- and second-generation members were interned in U.S. government detention camps during World War II. Like thousands of other Japanese Americans, they were forced to leave behind their homes and possessions, bringing only what they could carry in a suitcase.
Reflecting on that period, one Sugahara family member shared on camera: "Before the camps, we had this giant house. My father was doing well before the war. I sometimes wonder, ‘Wasn’t I deprived?’ It would have been easier had we had that. But then, as my mother said, ‘Sometimes what you think is the worst thing that can happen to you, turns out to be the best.’ "
After their release, the family faced further adversity in trying to repurchase land they had sold to neighbors. Looking at the options, their matriarch asserted, "Well, we can sit here and mope and complain, or we can make our way East and start a new life." Despite losses during the war and subsequent challenges, the family moved forward with resolve.
For the Sugaharas, the stories about the internment camps occupy a central place in their family narrative. The betrayal, pain and loss of that time was felt deeply. They didn’t shy away from sharing some of those emotions. Throughout, they managed to express both positive and negative emotions. On the one hand, they recognized that the government made a mistake in doubting the loyalty of Japanese Americans as a group, but they did not become embittered. Instead, their family’s first generation worked to demonstrate patriotism, encouraged others to do the same, and utilized civil and political channels to right the wrongs that had been made.
A member of the family’s third generation noted, "If we hadn’t had this bad thing happen, we wouldn’t have had all the good things afterward." This simple statement underscores the immense value of consciously passing on family stories and history. Rather than looking at “what happened” through rose-colored glasses, dwelling in bitterness or hiding away difficult moments, the Sugahara narrative emphasizes authenticity, agency and unity, serving as inspiration to future family members for how to navigate adversity and embrace growth opportunities.
For your family or the one you advise
As you consider your own family's narrative or those of client families, take note of the three interlocking building blocks of a resilience narrative:
- Positive-meaning making: Share stories that inspire agency by reflecting on how experiences changed us and what we learned from them.
- Coherence: Ensure that family narratives make sense to younger members, with clear timelines and cause-and-effect connections.
- Emotional truth: Be honest about the range of emotions experienced, acknowledging both positive outcomes and the challenges faced.
These elements of resilience narratives can be expressed in various settings, from casual dinner-table conversations to more lasting storytelling formats like books and films.
If your family or one you advise has faced challenges such as bankruptcy, lawsuits, death, divorce, illness, prejudice or other external pressures, sharing these experiences can help build a resilience narrative. Crafting a deliberate family narrative becomes a potent tool for nurturing intergenerational relationships and fostering long-term resilience. By harnessing this powerful asset, you can reap rewards both now and for generations to come.